Preamble

The House met at half-past Nine o'clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

Oral Answers to Questions — NORTHERN IRELAND

Diplock Courts (Status of Convicted Persons)

Mr. Dalyell: asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether, in view of the fact that the Diplock courts operate in a different way from courts in Scotland and England, he will take steps to grant political status to some of those convicted by them, as he considers appropriate.

The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr. Michael Alison): No, Sir.

Mr. Dalyell: May I thank the Minister, parliamentary colleagues, Northern Ireland Office civil servants and political parties in Northern Ireland for their courtesy and the time that they gave to our recent Labour Party delegation to Northern Ireland? May I quietly ask whether there is a case for different treatment, given that there is no Diplock-type court this side of the water? Does not the present situation simply feed resentment?

Mr. Alison: The different treatment to which the hon. Gentleman refers arises from the impact of terrorism on jury members. There is no good cause, therefore, for the individual terrorist to be treated in a specially favourable way by the court that he has sought to terrorise.

Mr. J. Enoch Powell: When taking any decisions, will the Government bear in mind the impact on prison discipline generally of any concessions and special treatment for prisoners who defy that discipline?

Mr. Alison: We are aware of that, and my right hon. Friend has underlined the extent to which we believe that terrorist acts should be treated as criminal acts, by the recent decision that he has announced in regard to special category prisoners.

Mr. Peter Robinson: Will the Minister take it from me that what is needed in Northern Ireland is a greater deterrent than prison sentencing, rather than a lesser one? In that regard, will he consider looking into the prospect of having mandatory sentences for various terrorist offences?

Mr. Alison: The Court has great flexibility in the matter of sentences, and I have no reason to believe that it does not have enough scope to deal with terrorists acts as the merits and nature of the acts deserve.

Mr. John: Will the hon. Gentleman accept that my hon. Friend the Member for West Lothian (Mr. Dalyell) has long been regarded as a most persistent questioner in Parliament, and this morning he has the distinction of being the earliest questioner in parliamentary history?
Will the hon. Gentleman accept that because there are no juries in Diplock courts, that does not mean that people are denied a fair trial? I reiterate my tribute to the impartiality which the Northern Ireland judiciary show to those accused in their courts. Will the Minister accept that some crimes are too horrible to be excused by any attribution of political motive? Will he therefore concentrate on other areas of the Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) Act which are now ripe for amendment?

Mr. Alison: On the last point, we shall certainly consider what the hon. Gentleman said. As he knows, the renewal of the Act is a regular cyclical process. We shall consider all representations that are made.
I fully endorse the hon. Gentleman's remarks about the integrity and fairness of the judicial processes. The hon. Member for West Lothian (Mr. Dalyell), who raised the question, will know that the Diplock courts, without a jury, afford the defendant a special access to the Court of Appeal which is not normal in other respects.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. I shall call one more hon. Member from each side.

Mr. Molyneax: Does the Minister of State agree that Diplock-type courts are not unique? For example, in London the stipendiary magistrates sit without juries, even on the most serious cases. Does the Minister recognise that the Official Unionist Members support the present Government, as we supported their predecessors, in their resolve to end political status for prisoners in any shape or form?

Mr. Alison: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for drawing our attention again to the variations of the normal jury process. There are stipendiary courts, to which he referred, and the Appeal Court to which I referred. I underline and accept the view that he expressed about the necessity to treat crimes and bloody murder as exactly that, and not as some idealised political acts.

Rev. Ian Paisley: Will the hon. Gentleman give the House an assurance that there will be no going back on the decision not to give political status to these terrorists—criminals who have been found guilty in a court of law? Does he appreciate that many prison officers have suffered as a result? Many have been killed because they have carried out the Government's will in this matter. They will view any going back on the decision as a betrayal of their stand.

Mr. Alison: I willingly give the hon. Gentleman that assurance. There can be nothing further from the mind of the Government, the Opposition, hon. Members or the people of this country than that there can be some sort of excuse, based upon motive, to mitigate the appalling crimes of murder, brutality, terrorism, and so on. We propose to treat those as criminal acts, and not as political acts requiring some sort of special indulgence.

Constitutional Conference

Mr. Latham: asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether he will make a statement on the outcome of his constitutional discussions with political leaders in the Province.

Mr. Hal Miller: asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether the

constitutional conference on his White Paper has finished its work.

Mr. Stanbrook: asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what proposals he now intends to make for the constitutional future of Northern Ireland.

Mr. Michael McNair-Wilson: asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement about the progress of the constitutional talks.

The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr. Humphrey Atkins): The conference adjourned on 24 March after considering each of the 14 items on the agenda. All the participants agreed that it would be an appropriate time for me to take stock of all that had been said and to report to the Cabinet. As was made clear in the working paper published last November, the aim of the conference from the outset has been to identify the highest level of agreement on how powers of government might be transferred to elected representatives in Northern Ireland. The conference is part of a continuing process to find new arrangements acceptable to both parts of the Community in Northern Ireland.
The conference has led to a valuable dialogue between the Government and the Northern Ireland political parties attending. It has clarified the parties' views, and it has increased my understanding, and theirs, of what our aims must be and the problems that must be solved. Perhaps even more significant, it revealed an acceptance by all concerned of the seven principles laid down in paragraph 5 of the working paper (Cmnd. 7763) which provided the basis for these meetings.
The Government are now considering the progress of the conference so far. In the light of what we have learnt the Government will be putting forward proposals for the fullest discussion and consultation.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. I propose to call first the four hon. Members whose questions are being answered.

Mr. Latham: I thank my right hon. Friend for that reply. Following the conference, will he consider whether it would be valuable to widen the basis of the discussions to enable other people in the community—for example, Church leaders


or leaders of industry, commerce or the trade unions—to participate, to see whether as broad a base of support as possible could emerge?

Mr. Atkins: That is an important part of what the Government should do, because when we are seeking some arrangements, and support for those arrangements, it is hoped that support will come from the political parties. However, everyone who will be affected by the proposals which the Government put forward will also have their views. I want to obtain views from as wide an area of opinion in Northern Ireland as I can.

Mr. Miller: I thank my right hon. Friend for his reply. Was I correct in hearing him say that he was thinking in terms of putting forward another consultative document after taking stock of the results of the conference? Can he give some indication of when he hopes to be in a position to take practical steps towards improving the quality of government in the Province, as outlined in our manifesto?

Mr. Atkins: I said that the Government would put forward proposals for the fullest discussion and consultation. That is what we shall do. I am not yet able to tell the House about the precise manner in which we shall do that. However, I assure hon. Members that we shall keep the House closely in touch with everything that we are doing, although I cannot give a final date at the present time.

Mr. Stanbrook: Is not it time, after nearly 10 years, for the Government to make up their own mind?

Mr. Atkins: So far as I am concerned, it should be 10 months.

Mr. McNair-Wilson: Can my right hon. Friend say whether, as a result of the conference, he has detected a sense of urgency to end direct rule? When he considers the question of the transfer of certain powers to a local government, does he see the need as being to create an administration to make good the obvious inadequacies of the present local government structure in the Province?

Mr. Atkins: All the political parties in Northern Ireland fought the general election on manifestos which included a desire to move away from the present system of direct rule to more locally based

arrangements. Therefore, in my consultation with the political parties it has been no surprise to find that they are keen to move forward. As I hope is well known, the Government are anxious to end direct rule as it now is and to replace it with some acceptable and workable arrangement in the Province.

Mr. Fitt: Is the Secretary of State aware that throughout the course of the conference there was intense speculation by political journalists and correspondents in Northern Ireland that the Government had a pigeon-holed plan, which had been conceived in advance of the conference? That was even stated by some of the participants to the conference. It was alleged that the Government were going through the motions of holding a conference but that they had preconceived ideas of what the solution might be. The right hon. Gentleman mentioned proposals. Are the Government now formulating those proposals? Were they formulated before the conference took place? Will those proposals be for discussion, or will they be for acceptance or rejection by the politicians in Northern Ireland?

Mr. Atkins: We are formulating proposals. They will certainly be for consultation and discussion—widely in the Province, in this House and so on. The hon. Gentleman is right to say that there was speculation, particularly among the press, that the Government had their own ideas, which they would put forward whatever the outcome of the conference. I hope and believe that the press and everyone else now recognise that that was not the case. This was a genuine attempt to find what level of agreement we could in order to formulate proposals which we could have reason to believe would command acceptability.

Mr. John: Does the right hon. Gentleman accept that one of the problems over the conference was that the circle of those originally consulted on the document was small? If he now thinks that that circle ought to be widened, will he take steps to ensure that the Government's proposals are circulated to them? He should take the initiative in calling talks.
Secondly, does the right hon. Gentleman accept that there is a paramount need for a parliamentay debate on these


proposals, and not merely that information should be supplied to Parliament? We shall need information not only about the Government's latest thinking but about the thinking of the participants to the conference, so that we may inform ourselves fully. Will the right hon. Gentleman resist the blandishments of the hon. Member for Orpington (Mr. Stanbrook)? There is nothing that some people in Northern Ireland, and some hon. Members, would like better than the imposition of a settlement from outside, but only a settlement that is arrived at by consensus is likely to be of lasting value.

Mr. Atkins: I entirely agree with the last part of the hon. Gentleman's question. I note that he believes that a debate in Parliament, after the proposals have been published, would be advantageous. I agree with him, and I shall draw the attention of my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House to what he has said.
I totally agree about the widest possible level of consultation. We cannot possibly impose a solution upon the people of Northern Ireland against their will—at least, if we tried to, it would fail. Therefore, we all want to obtain the views of as many people as possible, be they the views of the political parties or of people who are not politicians but who nevertheless will be closely affected by anything that we do.

Mr. Kilfedder: Does the Secretary of State recall the warning given by myself and other hon. Members in November and December of last year that the conference would fail because he deliberately excluded all Ulster Members from the constitutional talks? Will he now consider the proposition that I made then, that all Ulster Members should debate the constitutional issue publicly in Stormont? We could then have a referendum in Northern Ireland, which would give the people the option of total integration, which I reject, or a devolved Parliament at Stormont, which I am certain they would wish.

Mr. Atkins: The hon. Gentleman is incorrect in saying that the conference failed. It did no such thing. It was extremely valuable to the Government and, I believe, to those parties which attended. As to the future, I note that he wants the matter discussed with Northern

Ireland Members. I suggest that it should be discussed here, because we can then obtain the views of all the Northern Ireland representatives as well as other hon. Members. After all, in the end, this House and the other place will have the final say about what is done.

Mr. Stallard: Has the Secretary of State yet discovered that the biggest stumbling block to any permanent solution in Northern Ireland is the existence of the unconditional underwriting of the Unionist veto in Northern Ireland politics? In the run-up to the proposals that he intends to put to the House, will he consider ways and means of bringing that unconditional underwriting to an end and thereby allow ordinary political development to take place in Northern Ireland?

Mr. Atkins: The hon. Gentleman is mistaken. The guarantee is not unconditional. It is highly conditional for as long as the people of Northern Ireland wish that Northern Ireland should remain part of the United Kingdom. That is a very severe condition, so the hon. Gentleman is wrong.

Security

Mr. Molyneaux: asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether he is satisfied with frontier security arrangements.

Mr. Biggs-Davison: asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement about security, with particular reference to the border counties.

Mr. Humphrey Atkins: Since I last addressed the House on 6 March, three people, including two members of the King's Own Border Regiment, have died as a result of terrorist activity in Northern Ireland. There have been a number of other attacks on members of the security forces, one of which resulted in serious injuries to a part-time member of the UDR and another yesterday in Crossmaglen to a soldier. But on two other occasions members of the RUC, having come under armed attack, warded it off and made red-handed arrests.
During the period in question the security forces have maintained their pressure on the terrorists. Forty-eight


people have been charged with terrorist-type offences, including five with murder and 10 with attempted murder. Sixteen weapons and 891 rounds of ammunition have been seized as well as a substantial collection of bomb-making equipment, which has enabled the RUC to bring a number of criminal charges.
No one holding my office could be satisfied about security in the border areas as long as terrorists are active there; but I can assure the House that, although it would not be in the public interest to give details, the security forces use all possible means to counter the terrorists. What I can say is that we attach great importance to co-operation with the Republic of Ireland in efforts to neutralise the terrorists' use of the border. I am equally clear that the authorities in the Republic recognise this need, and I am glad to say that there has been considerable progress on this front. I am confident that this will continue to improve and that it will play no small part in the eventual suppression of crime in Northern Ireland.

Mr. Molyneaux: On the question of frontier crossings by vehicles, can the Secretary of State explain why the existing control legislation appears to have fallen into disuse? How many Customs stations have been moved back more than three miles from the frontier?

Mr. Atkins: The old system of checking vehicles crossing the border was gradually relaxed over a period of years because it became unwieldy, with the growth of legitimate border traffic. However, Customs and Excise, together with its counterpart in the Republic, has agreed to, and is now introducing, a new system of joint documentation that will monitor the cross-border traffic of vehicles. This is expected to come into operation very soon. I cannot, without notice, tell the hon. Member how many Customs posts have been moved back from the border, but a number of them were, chiefly in the interests of the safety of the staff.

Mr. Biggs-Davison: Will my right hon. Friend tender to the Ulster Defence Regiment our thanks and admiration now that it is 10 years old? On the border where the UDR has suffered many cruel casualties, are there enough troops to maintain public morale and also to prevent arms

and land from falling into the hands of the IRA mafia?

Mr. Atkins: I know that the whole House will be grateful for what my hon. Friend has said and, indeed, will wish to support the early-day motion which he and his hon. Friends have put on the Order Paper in those terms. I know also that the Regiment itself will be very pleased at his expression of support, which I wholly endorse.
The second matter that my hon. Friend raised, about land falling into the hands of undesirable people, is a difficult one. I do not believe that this is happening in the way that some fear, but a question of morale is involved, especially in remote country districts. However, from every contact that I have with the UDR, I can see that morale is extremely high.

Mr. McCusker: Is the Secretary aware that this year four people have been killed within hundreds of yards of the border in my constituency? How good is co-operation with the security forces in the Republic, if such killings can occur with that regularity?

Mr. Atkins: I said in my original answer that I can never be satisfied as long as terrorists remain active in the area, and I am not. But co-operation is better than it was, and is still improving.

Rev. Ian Paisley: As many police have recently been moved to the border, do they have adequate weaponry to deal with terrorists, and have they had adequate training in the use of that weaponry? Will the right hon. Gentleman tell us whether the arms that were ordered from the United States are now available to the RUC?

Mr. Atkins: The arms that were ordered from the United States have been delivered. There is a requirement for a further supply of arms, though not immediately. I assure the hon. Gentleman that the RUC has all the weapons that it needs and, judging by the events of the past few months, it is clear that they are becoming increasingly skilled in the use of those weapons.

Mr. John: Will the right hon. Gentleman accept that though we all agree with the hon. Member for Armagh (Mr. McCusker) in grieving over the frequency of killings, nevertheless one of the values of


border operations that cannot be discussed is the deterrent effect of these operations? Secondly, does he agree that the arms find yesterday is a symbol that, although not perfect, the link and agreement with the Republic are working?

Mr. Atkins: Yes, Sir. The hon. Gentleman is right on both counts. The purpose of security forces is primarily to deter and to prevent crime, and I believe that they are succeeding slowly in this objective. Like the hon. Gentleman, I congratulate the Garda on its arms find yesterday. It will be another severe deterrent to terrorism.

Mr. W. Benyon: Is it not a fact that known terrorists are moving about the Province with impunity because there is unsufficient evidence to take proceedings against them? Has my right hon. Friend had discussions recently with the Law Officers to see whether any special legal procedures can be devised to take account of these special and exceptional circumstances?

Mr. Atkins: Yes, I have, and these discussions are continuing, but we have to move with great caution so long as the Government's policy is to operate within the rule of law. We are all determined that we should continue to do this, but if there are ways in which the law can be improved and yet not be regarded as unfair, we shall follow them.

Irish Congress of Trade Unions

Mr. Parry: asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland when he expects to meet the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, Northern Ireland committee.

Mr. Humphrey Atkins: I met representatives of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, Northern Ireland committee on 11 March 1980, and have no immediate plans for another meeting.

Mr. Parry: When the Secretary of State next meets the Northern Ireland committee of the ICTU, will he tell it what plans he has to reduce the high level of unemployment in Northern Ireland, and discuss with it the serious effects of public spending cuts on the poorer sections of the community, especially in urban areas?

Mr. Atkins: We discussed both those matters at my meeting on 11 March, and

I look forward to further meetings with the Northern Ireland committee, at which I shall continue to explain Government policies and seek to get the committee's support for them.

Mr. Fitt: Will the Secretary of State accept that the demonstrations that took place throughout Northern Ireland yesterday, under the auspices of the trade union movement, were almost an expression of concern over the fears now being expressed throughout Northern Ireland about the Government's doctrinaire Tory policies? Does he accept that the ICTU has predicted that within the next year the number of unemployed in Northern Ireland will increase by a further 8,000? Will he confirm or deny those suspicions?

Mr. Atkins: No, Sir. The ICTU is entitled to make any predictions that it likes. I was aware of the reasons for the demonstrations yesterday. I regret those demonstrations, because I do not believe that they serve a useful purpose in seeking to reduce unemployment. I have explained to the ICTU, and shall continue to explain, Government policies, some of which it does not suport. I am glad to say that people in the country generally support Government policies.

Mr. Kilfedder: Does the Secretary of State realise that it is not simply a question of reducing the already high level of unemployment of 65,000? It is a question of facing the bleak prospect of having about 115,000 unemployed in Northern Ireland as a result of Government cuts—and that in a Province where the cost of living is already high, and where gas, electricity and coal are far dearer than in Great Britain.

Mr. Atkins: Not for the first time, I find myself unable to accept the hon. Gentleman's predictions.

Mr. John: Does the right hon. Gentleman accept that the public expenditure figures published last week show that public expenditure in 1983–84 will be £130 million less than it is now, £62 million of that being accounted for by less aid to industry? How does he expect that to do other than increase unemployment, lower the standards of public provision and cause a great deal of further job loss in both the private and the public sectors?

Mr. Atkins: The hon Gentleman will have seen from the White Paper that public expenditure forecasts for Northern Ireland give a higher level than in any year before the one in which his Government thought that an election was just coming. The answer to the hon. Gentleman's second point is that the reduced figure that he mentions takes account of the reduction in the electricity subsidy.

Elected Local Authorities

Mr. Marlow: asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on the progress towards giving effect to the Government's policy to set up one or more elected local authorities similar to county councils.

Mr. Humphrey Atkins: It is important to recognise that the Government's policy is to seek an acceptable way of transferring powers to elected representatives in Northern Ireland. The conference working paper contained six illustrative models of government, one of which described how executive powers might be exercised by one or more local authorities. Having heard the views of the parties represented at the conference and of others, I am clear that such a solution would fall short of commanding wide acceptance.

Mr. Marlow: Does my right hon. Friend agree that, whatever the discussions and proposals at the constitutional conference, it is the responsibility of this House, and this House alone, to introduce whatever measures are right and proper, and that the main concern of the House will be that there should on no account be introduced measures that would in any way damage the present or future integrity of the United Kingdom?

Mr. Atkins: I agree, and I would add that the measures that the House introduces must command acceptance among the people to whom they will apply.

Mr. Freeson: Does the Secretary of State accept that, whatever may be the future internal government arrangements on an elective basis, and whatever may be the links between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom constitutionally, it will be fundamentally wrong and will result in continued troubles throughout the genera-

tions if we do not introduce an all-Ireland dimension into the future political development of the Province?

Mr. Atkins: What the Government wish to do is to return to people elected in the Province powers over their own affairs. It will be for that body to decide what relations it wishes to have with authorities in the South.

Dr. Mawhinney: Will my right hon. Friend confirm that all the official submissions received by the conference were in favour of a devolved Government rather than a local council set-up, and that the question, which says that it is present. Government policy to set up quasi local councils, is incorrect?

Mr. Atkins: Yes, Sir. I can give the same answer to both parts of my hon. Friend's question.

De Lorean Motor Company Limited

Mr. Michael Brown: asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a further statement about the De Lorean motor car project.

Mr. Bruce-Gardyne: asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he has yet reached a decision on the latest application for financial assistance by the De Lorean company.

Mr. Cryer: asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on the De Lorean car company.

The Under-Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr. Giles Shaw): I understand that satisfactory progress is being maintained and that pilot production will start before the end of the second quarter of this year. I have not yet reached a decision on the company's application for additional assistance.

Mr. Brown: In the hope that my hon. Friend's mind is still open on the matter, and bearing in mind that many other public corporations are having to observe strict economies, may I ask my hon. Friend whether the whole incident concerning the De Lorean motor car project does not verge on the scandalous? He surely has a clear duty to treat with contempt the application for additional funds.

Mr. Shaw: The project was entered into by the previous Government under binding arrangements, and the present Government have every intention of carrying them out. I cannot agree with my hon. Friend that the position is scandalous. I view the potential creation of 2,000 jobs in the area as a matter of considerable importance to the Province. I assure my hon. Friend and the House that, in terms of additional expenditure, the Government will look most closely at the application that has been made.

Mr. Bruce-Gardyne: How can my hon. Friend look most closely at the application if the obligations are binding? Is he aware that Mr. De Lorean has now revealed that what he is after is not £5 million of extra Government money but £8 million?

Mr. Stallard: Entrepreneur.

Mr. Bruce-Gardyne: Is there any precedent anywhere else in the United Kingdom, or for that matter in the world, for such a deal, by which that gentleman got all the equity for none of the cash, and on top of that apparently received a guarantee against exchange rate movements and increases in inflation?

Mr. Shaw: The arrangements to which my hon. Friend refers allowed the company to make application. What it did not suggest was a commitment that that application would be met in full. The Government are considering the application, the sums involved and the methods of funding, if any.

Mr. Cryer: Does the Minister accept that it is important to provide jobs in West Belfast, but also that the cost appears to be on the high side in this venture? Will he confirm that the electric reservoir moulding wonder process does not work, that the original wonder car was productionised by Lotus Cars, and that the total rights of the design and development, which had been paid for by the taxpayer, are retained by the De Lorean research partnership? Does not that seem to be a fairly bad bargain for the taxpayer?

Mr. Shaw: It is not true that the ERM process has failed. It will not be used for this project, but development work is proceeding on it satisfactorily. As regards development of the car, I should

have thought that the hon. Gentleman would accept that development carried out by Lotus Cars, and engineering carried out by Renault, currently leading the world championship, indicate that the car will have a pedigree second to none in the market in which it is designed to compete. As regards the taxpayer, we have every intention of seeing that the vehicle sells, and sells well.

Mr. Hal Miller: When considering a request for assistance, will my hon. Friend look closely at the conditions in the motor industry in the United States, and not be led away by the forecasts of Mr. De Lorean? Will he take account of the forecasts of other car makers in this country who are attempting to sell sports cars in the United States?

Mr. Shaw: I appreciate my hon. Friend's concern and his knowledge of motor industry affairs. What is under discussion is a matter of forecasting not the sales or marketing but the additonal costs incurred on the present project. However, I confirm that we are taking the widest possible sounding on the projections so that we can reach the best possible decision.

Miss Maynard: Whilst I accept that the jobs in question may be unacceptably expensive, does the Minister agree that the latest figures show that Northern Ireland has the highest unemployment in Western Europe and the lowest wages, and that essential goods there are the most expensive? In view of that, should not the Government exclude Northern Ireland from their latest public expenditure cuts, which will only make more people unemployed?

Mr. Shaw: The matter has already been dealt with in general in the House, but in relation to the De Lorean project I trust that the hon. Lady will understand that with the 2,000 jobs in the plant comes a spin-off in terms of community expenditure that is significantly greater.

Mr. Pendry: Will the Minister accept once more from these Benches our general support for his approach to the De Lorean project? Will he inform his hon. Friends, in particular the hon. Member for Brigg and Scunthorpe (Mr. Brown), that the steel used at De Lorean is almost certainly from areas such as


Scunthorpe, and that if his hon. Friend had his constituents' best interests at heart he would encourage the development of that project and not knock it? Further, will he tell the House the results of his talks, promised during the recent Appropriations debate, with the management of De Lorean on the question of absorbing more of the unemployed of West Belfast?

Mr. Shaw: In relation to both those points, I assure the hon. Gentleman that many British components, including steel, are currently being used. I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Scunthorpe (Mr. Brown) will help us to reduce the price currently being offered by the British Steel Corporation. On the second point, I confirm that discussions will take place with the company to see whether we can obtain a weighting in favour of the long-term unemployed.

Publicly Owned Buildings (Sale)

Mr. Wm. Ross: asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether he has any plans for speeding up the sale of publicly owned dwellings in Northern Ireland.

The Under-Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr. Philip Goodhart): I have asked the Northern Ireland Housing Executive to give urgent consideration to ways and means of speeding up the sale of dwellings to sitting tenants who wish to purchase their homes. I understand that the chairman of the executive will be leading a small working group to consider this matter.
At 21 March, under our new house sales policy, 20,659 applications had been received by the executive and 17,476 valuations had been requested from the valuation office, of which 4,867 valuations had been made.

Mr. Ross: I thank the Minister for his reply, but is it not clear from the record that last year the Housing Executive was able to process about 2,000 sales? What guarantee can he give to those who have applied to buy a house that he can multiply that figure by 10 this year? Is he aware that while the price of a house may be tied to the date of application, a long delay means that improvements that need to be carried out

will cost a great deal more? Can anything be done to alleviate that problem? Finally, has the Housing Executive any plans to carry out a survey of the ownership of the land on which many rural cottages now stand?

Mr. Goodhart: We are looking at the whole problem of title indemnification, which is integral to the hon. Gentleman's last question. I have every reason to think that there will be no hold-up in the continuing flow of offers being made to tenants. We should significantly exceed the number of offers that were made last year under the old sales policy.

Mr. Peter Robinson: Will the Minister take it from me that, in my constituency at least, it is not the Northern Ireland Housing Executive that is causing delay, but the valuation office? Will he take steps to expedite the process?

Mr. Goodhart: We had expected problems on valuation, but the figures that I have given show that nearly 5,000 valuations have been made in recent weeks. I suggest that the problem will be less serious than we had anticipated.

Mr. J. Enoch Powell: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that before the Government came into office the Housing Executive already had a substantial programme for the sale of houses? Is he further aware that the actual speed of sale has not been increased by piling the plans of the new Government on top of that?

Mr. Goodhart: I am satisfied that there will be a significant improvement in the coming months.

Mr. Fitt: As a Tory Minister with some experience of finance, can the hon. Gentleman give any indication of what he would regard as the true going-rate for a flat in Divis Towers, Ballymurphy, Turf Lodge, or some of the more affluent areas of Belfast?

Mr. Goodhart: I do not expect many applications from people in flats in Divis Towers. However, we have a programme, costing £7 million, which should lead to a massive improvement in the conditions of those tenants, provided that we are allowed to go ahead, and that those who are trying to sabotage the programme do not succeed.

Mr. Pendry: In view of the plight of many young couples who cannot possibly afford the high mortgage rates, which have rocketed as a result of the Government's policies, surely rather than speed up the process the Minister should reconsider the policy not to sell off these valuable assets, especially in areas of high demand for rented accommodation?

Mr. Goodhart: We have taken the lead in Northern Ireland in developing co-ownership schemes, particularly the co-ownership housing associations. They offer particular opportunities to young married couples. I am glad that Northern Ireland is doing better in this respect than other parts of the United Kingdom.

PRIME MINISTER (ENGAGEMENTS)

Mr. O'Neill: asked the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for 3 April.

The Prime Minister (Mrs. Margaret Thatcher): In addition to my duties in this House, I shall be having meetings with ministerial colleagues and others.

Mr. O'Neill: Will the Prime Minister take time today to consider a report in today's press to the effect that manufacturing output will fall by 4½ per cent. and that unemployment is likely to rise to 2½ million? Is it not disgraceful that that announcement was not made last week, at the time of the Budget Statement? Could it be that the right hon. Lady and her colleague the Chancellor of the Exchequer did not have that information? If they did not know about it, will they find time during the recess to produce another Budget that will take that information into consideration?

The Prime Minister: If the hon. Member reads the Red Book, he will find the official Government forecast. I know of many forecasts, and some of them are very gloomy. We had some extremely gloomy forecasts for the end of last year, but, in the outturn, the standard of living rose by about 6 per cent.

Mr. Bruce-Gardyne: Will my right hon. Friend find time today to refute reports in the press this morning to the effect that the consequence of the tax agreed in Brussels on food imports into Britain

will be to increase the cost of our contribution to the Community budget? If that were the case, would it not undermine our position when negotiating with the Community?

The Prime Minister: As my hon. Friend knows, we are trying to secure substantial reductions in our contribution to the Community. I am aware of some of the complicated factors about MCAs. They are designed to see that our producers get a fair deal in competition with others. I have a brief on this subject that consists of two whole pages of foolscap. I assure my hon. Friend that it is highly complicated and that he would prefer me not to read it out.

Mr. Foot: Although it is highly complicated, does not the right hon. Lady think that it is highly important as well, since the report states that under these arrangements we are to have a tax on food coming into this country? When will she report to the House? Does she regard this as a further example of her success in EEC diplomacy?

The Prime Minister: I do not think that the report is quite right. As the right hon. Gentleman knows, my right hon Friend the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food wants the system to apply in such a way that it will not subject British producers to unfair competition. We are both very concerned about prices to the housewife. However, it would be far better if the right hon. Gentleman were to ask for the full details from my right hon. Friend. I can spend the whole of Question Time on this subject, but I am not sure that it would be illuminating either to the right hon. Gentleman or to me.

Mr. Foot: Will the right hon. Lady confirm, as her right hon. Friend and the report have indicated, that it is not only a question of the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, but that it concerns the consequences for Britain's contribution to the budget as a whole? Is it not she who is answerable to the House on all those issues?

The Prime Minister: Of course I am concerned about the consequences for the British contribution to the Community as a whole. With that in mind, we look at every change proposed in the CAP, in order to ensure that it is not adverse


to Britain's interests. Some of the proposed changes are adverse to our interests. That is why we could not possibly agree to them. There is no doubt about that.

Mr. Cyril D. Townsend: Does my right hon. Friend realise that the style and content of the Government's White Paper on defence were greatly appreciated by all Conservative Members, and no doubt by those in the Armed Forces? Does she agree that the Government still need to make a massive effort to put over to the people of Britain, particularly the young, the need for NATO to update its nuclear weapons and to maintain defence expenditure at that level?

The Prime Minister: I am grateful to my hon. Friend, I agree that the level of defence expenditure must be related to the level of the force that we have to deter. That must happen at all levels, whether nuclear, theatre nuclear or conventional. A decision has not yet been made about the updating of nuclear weapons. My right hon. Friend will report to the House when it has.

Mr. Soley: Will the Prime Minister take time today to consider arranging meetings between herself and the Prime Minister of the Irish Republic on a regular basis, so that matters of concern to both countries can be discussed in a systematic way?

The Prime Minister: We meet at the European summits, and I shall be meeting the Prime Minister of the Irish Republic at the next European summit towards the end of April. I believe that it is preferable for more regular meetings to be held on security matters between my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland and his opposite number in the Irish Republic.

Mr. Hill: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the Militant Tendency movement has completely taken over the Southampton Labour Party, and that the citizens of Southampton are alarmed that after the next local election there may be for the first time in living memory a Communist-controlled local authority?

The Prime Minister: I trust that my hon. Friend will be sufficiently active in Southampton in our cause to see that that does not happen.

AFGHANISTAN

Mr. Dalyell: asked the Prime Minister whether, in framing policy in relation to Afghanistan, Her Majesty's Government took into account the torture and massacre of a significant number of Russian technical advisers in Herat on and about 5 April 1979.

The Prime Minister: I can neither confirm nor deny the report about the treatment of Russian technical advisers in Herat last year. Even if the report is true, it would not have justified the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan eight months later and the subsequent killing of large numbers of Afghan men, women and children.

Mr. Dalyell: Will the Prime Minister accept the ghoulish truth, of which I gave her office details 11 days ago, that about a year ago to the day 30 Russian technical advisers were forced to eat their own testicles, they were then skinned alive and their heads were paraded through Herat by Afghan factions? Does the right hon. Lady agree that it is not surprising that Mother Russia will not sit by and see factional crises of militant irredentist Islam on her Central Asian borders—[Hon. Members: "Reading."]
Yes, I am reading, because I am asking a careful and precise question.

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman knows that it is out of order to read questions. As he has confessed before the House to reading, I have no alternative but to ask him to try to remember that.

Mr. Dalyell: Do not the British know better than most that once an army is sucked into factional tribal strife it is much more difficult to get that army out?

The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman asked me if I could confirm those reports. I can only tell him that I can neither confirm nor deny them.
The hon Gentleman knows that I am the first to condemn all violence, by whomsoever it is perpetrated. However, the hon. Gentleman knows that the answer to violence is not for one nation to march into another's territory and perpetrate further acts of violence. I hope that he will agree that that can never be


justified and will join almost all hon. Members in asking the Russians to withdraw their troops from Afghanistan.

Mr. Tapsell: Has my right hon. Friend seen the reports that many hundreds of thousands of Afghans have been murdered by the forces of the Soviet Union since Afghanistan was invaded? Will she accept that my information is that every Afghan to whom I talked during my last visit to Kabul 18 months ago, from Nur Mohammed Tarakki downwards, has been killed? As these massacres are continuing, could a new international initiative be taken to persuade the United Nations to impose universal economic sanctions against the USSR?

The Prime Minister: I believe that a large number of atrocities are being and have been committed. My hon. Friend and I will condemn them with all the force and power at our command, and also condemn the Russian invasion of Afghanistan.
As my hon. Friend knows, the President of the United States suggested that certain measures should be taken against Russia, including sanctions on technological exports and the export of wheat. We do not yet have universal acceptance of those sanctions. We are therefore trying to co-operate with our European partners and our American friends. My right hon. and noble Friend the Foreign Secretary made a most constructive suggestion to help to get troops out of Afghanistan. He suggested that Afghanistan could be a neutral country, and therefore its security would be guaranteed. That should enable the Russians to take their troops out of Afghanistan if they wished to.

Mr. James Lamond: With regard to that proposal by the Foreign Secretary, who does the right hon. Lady believe would guarantee the neutrality of Afghanistan? Have the Government had the courtesy to approach the Government of Afghanistan on the matter?

The Prime Minister: There have been talks between Powers, but not specifically between ourselves and the Government of Afghanistan. The hon. Gentleman is less than welcoming to an initiative that was genuinely meant to try to defuse the situation, to the great advantage of the people of Afghanistan and many of the surrounding countries.

Mr. Biggs-Davison: Is not the way to end all atrocities in Afghanistan for the Soviet Union to end its occupation?

Mr. Dalyell: Like Northern Ireland.

Mr. Biggs-Davison: In view of the ominous statements from Kabul about the validity of the Durand line, will Her Majesty's Government use their influence, which they still have on the Subcontinent, to try to improve Judo-Pakistan co-operation for the safety of the Sub-continent?

The Prime Minister: The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was the invasion by a foreign Power of an independent country, which bears no relation whatever to our troops being in Northern Ireland. Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom.
We shall do all that we can to secure the improvement of relations between India and Pakistan. I agree with my hon. Friend that they are vital to future peace in that area.

PRIME MINISTER (ENGAGEMENTS)

Mr. McKelvey: asked the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 3 April.

The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply that I gave earlier.

Mr. McKelvey: Will the Prime Minister take time today to consider the plight of our carpet industry? Is there any possibility of an early settlement with the EEC regarding import quotas for tufted carpets? Will the right hon. Lady confer with the Secretary of State for Industry with a view to extending the reimbursement period for those on the temporary short-term compensation scheme within the carpet industry in particular, and in industry generally?

The Prime Minister: As the hon. Gentleman knows, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade applied for quotas on the tufted carpet industry because of the level of imports. The Community felt that the level of imports was not sufficiently high to warrant a quota. My right hon. Friend and the Community are monitoring the quantity of imports that come in and will not hesitate to take action should it become too high.

Mr. Thornton: In view of the news of yet another factory closure in Liverpool which has nothing to do with the normal reasons for such closures, will my right hon. Friend press the Ministers concerned to make as much speed as possible with the enterprise zone, which will give the people in the area a much-needed shot in the arm?

The Prime Minister: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. The enterprise zone scheme is extremely interesting, and will bring a lot of hope to people in areas where there has been precious little. The problem will be to limit enterprise zones, because I believe that we shall have a flood of applications. We shall press ahead as fast as we can, and I hope that the experiment will be thoroughly successful.

Dr. Owen: Will the Prime Minister indicate to the House the consequences of the proposed or possible cancellation of the two AGRs at Heysham and Torness for the power generating industry? Will she give a further assurance that no decision will be taken and announced during the recess?

The Prime Minister: We have not yet decided. As the right hon. Gentleman knows, we are looking once again at the nuclear programme in view of the fact

that the consumption of electricity is very much less than had been anticipated. The particular factor to which he refers namely, the effect upon the nuclear power industry, is one that will be taken into account when deciding. I assure him that at the moment no decision has been taken.

Mr. McCrindle: Will the Prime Minister confirm that in the event of a national railway strike the attitude of the Government will be as non-interventionist as it was during the 13 weeks of the steel strike? Will she further confirm that any settlement of the railway dispute should include a high level of productivity, which many of us who use the services of British Rail feel there is ample opportunity to achieve?

The Prime Minister: I am glad to respond to my hon. Friend. The cash limit for British Rail is very high. It is over £700 million this year. It will be something like £730 million to £740 million next year. British Rail must live within that cash limit and accordingly make a settlement in its own way through its own negotiations. May I express one thought? I hope that British Rail will not automatically assume that the railway travelling public will go on paying ever higher fares, because they cannot do that.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Mr. Foot: May I ask the Leader of the House to state the business for the week after the Easter Recess?

The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. Norman St. John-Stevas): The business for the first week after the Adjournment will be as follows:
MONDAY 14 APRIL—Second Reading of the Criminal Justice (Scotland) Bill [Lords].
Motions on the following Northern Ireland orders:
Domestic proceedings.
Maintenance orders (consequential amendments).
Bankruptcy, and bankruptcy (consequential amendments).
TUESDAY 15 APRIL—Second Reading of the Social Security (No. 2) Bill.
Remaining stages of the Insurance Companies Bill [Lords]. Consideration of Lords Amendments to the Companies Bill [Lords].
WEDNESDAY 16 APRIL—Consideration of a timetable motion on the Housing Bill.
Second Reading of the Port of London (Financial Assistance) Bill.
Motions on the Shipbuilding (Redundancy Payments Scheme) (Amendment) Orders for Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
THURSDAY 17 APRIL—Progress on remaining stages of the Employment Bill.
FRIDAY 18 APRIL—Private Members' motions.

Mr. Foot: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that, apart from the offensive nature of the legislation, the proposal for the business is quite unsatisfactory to us and we do not believe that it is satis factory to the House?
Why is the Leader of the House proposing a guillotine motion on the Housing Bill, when, as I understand, the Standing Committee has reached clause 93 out of about 120 clauses? I should have thought that that was considerable progress. What excuse has the right hon. Gentleman for bringing forward a guillotine motion?
When are we to have a day for a debate on the public expenditure White Paper, which was promised? Why has the right hon. Gentleman not given the Opposition a Supply day? We afforded facilities to the Government some weeks ago and the failure to provide a Supply day this week means that we have gone almost a month without one. That is totally unsatisfactory.
Will the right hon. Gentleman give an undertaking that we will have a full debate fairly soon on the Brandt Commission report? We are concerned about his statement in yesterday's debate on the subject when he made it clear that he did not at the moment contemplate giving Government time for a debate. We had always assumed that there was to be an agreement that Government time would be given with, perhaps, the Opposition contributing. We regard the report as being of major importance.
Will the right hon. Gentleman take into account that we strongly support the proposal made by my hon. Friend the Member for West Lothian (Mr. Dalyell) that we should also have a debate on the important matter of safety in the North Sea?

Mr. St. John-Stevas: I am grateful for those five questions.
I would much prefer to have reached an agreement with the Opposition on the timetable for the Housing Bill. Unfortunately, there was no agreed outcome following conversations through the usual channels. That is the reason for the guillotine motion.
I am afraid that I cannot promise a Supply day during the week following our return, but I will certainly look at the business after that with a view to providing a Supply day at an early date.
I have said to the Leader of the Opposition that we should have a debate on the public expenditure White Paper. However, I have to take into account the fact that the Select Committee on the Treasury and the Civil Service is considering the White Paper and is taking evidence at this moment. The precedent has been, in relation to the Expenditure Committee, that the debate on the public expenditure White Paper has never been held, I understand, without a report having been made to the House.
I welcome the fact that my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge (Mr. Rhodes James) initiated a valuable and important debate on the Brandt Commission, during which a ministerial statement was made from the Government Front Bench. I do not rule out a further debate, but I think that it is unreasonable that I should be asked for another debate on the Brandt Commission report so soon after the debate that has already taken place.
The Burgoyne report on safety in the North Sea is most important. It is precisely because it is important that its recommendations must be fully considered before a debate is held.

Mr. Foot: The right hon. Gentleman will know that there was considerable controversy because the public expenditure White Paper was published only at the time of the Budget itself and we were thereby denied a debate on it before dealing with the Budget. Will the right hon. Gentleman give an absolute guarantee that we shall have that promised debate before the Second Reading of the Finance Bill?
Will the right hon. Gentleman also undertake to look afresh at the business that he has announced? It is not satisfactory to us. Will he make an announcement after the recess about the possibility of having our Supply day properly allocated for the week when we come back? That could easily be arranged. The Employment Bill on Thursday could be put off until the following week. We would then have our rights for a Supply day properly fulfilled.
We would regard it as real backsliding by the Government if they tried to wriggle out of the obligation to have a full debate in Government time on the Brandt Commission report. I am sure that the Opposition would be prepared to contribute so that the House might give proper recognition to the importance of the subject.

Mr. St. John-Stevas: I suppose that we could go on debating this matter for some time, but there are other hon. Members who wish to ask questions.
I must take into account, in relation to the public expenditure White Paper, the consideration now being given by the Select Committee and I am grateful to have the support of hon. Gentlemen below

the Gangway on this. I have to balance conflicting demands.
I have said on previous occasions that it is the duty of the Government to allot Supply days. I have indicated that although I cannot acceed to the right hon. Gentleman's request for a Supply day in the first week after the recess I will consider what he has said in relation to the business which has not yet been announced.
I have said several times in the House how important the Brandt Commission report is. However, since we have recently had a full debate on the subject, I do not think that it is reasonable for the Opposition to ask for an early debate on the same subject. But I have not ruled out a further debate in due course.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. Before I call another hon. Member, I remind the House that we must try to be fair to those hon. Members who were lucky in the ballot for Adjournment debates. I hope, therefore, that questions will be reasonably brief.

Mr. Eldon Griffiths: Since it has been the invariable practice of Governments to accept and implement the will of the House, will the Leader of the House tell us what he is doing about early-day motion No. 17, which now has the signatures of 312 hon. Members from all parties?
[That this House urges Her Majesty's Government to ban the import of all whale products and to work to secure a world wide ban on the slaughter of whales.]
The motion is also supported by many members of the Government, who are not able to sign it. When does my right hon. Friend intend to debate the motion, and when are Ministers expected to implement the House's will on this matter?

Mr. St. John-Stevas: In case all hon. Members do not know what the motion is about, it concerns a ban on the import of whale products. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Bury St. Edmunds (Mr. Griffiths), I am a strong supporter of conservation, including conservation of animals. We should work for an agreement through the International Whaling Commission. We are currently considering our policy on this mattes, but I do not think that it is possible to have a debate on the subject at present.

Mr. English: Has not the Leader of the House a rather potty order of priorities? Since when has bankruptcy in Northern Ireland been more important than the BBC cuts, the decision on which will be made on 17 April? Will the right hon. Member expedite the Government's reply to the first special report of the Treasury Committee? It is ridiculous that public expenditure should be at the centre of political discussion yet should not be discussed in the House.

Mr. St. John-Steyas: I shall draw the second matter to the attention of my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer. On the question of the comparative importance of business, it depends on the involvement of hon. Members. I am sure that hon. Members from Northern Ireland consider that the proceedings on bankruptcy in Northern Ireland are extremely important to them.

Mr. David Steel: Without prejudice to the ruling which you, Mr. Speaker, undertook to give to the question raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith), may I ask whether the right hon. Gentleman is aware that the question of our representation in the Council of Europe does not have to be determined until the week after the recess? Will he accept that if there is to be any change in the long-established rights of the Liberal Party in this representation it cannot be done unilaterally by the Government by means of a written answer? It must be debated in the House.

Mr. St. John-Steyas: On the question of assignation of representation at the Council of Europe, the Government are responsible for their own representation. Traditionally the representation of the Opposition parties has been a matter for the official Opposition in discussion with the minority parties. I suggest that the right hon. Gentleman pursues the matter vigorously with the Leader of the Opposition.

Mr. Latham: On the important proposal for enterprise zones, referred to earlier today by the Prime Minister, will my right hon Friend tell the House the method of legislative enactment for these proposals? How soon will it be done, and when will the proposals be produced?

Mr. St. John-Stevas: This matter is under consideration by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. I assure my hon. Friend that my right hon. and learned Friend has every intention of proceeding with speed because of the importance that he and all other members of the Government attach to this new experiment.

Mr. Stott: Is the Leader of the House aware of the concern felt on both sides of the House about the siting of the Inmos production units? Will he ensure that the decision is not taken during the Easter Recess and that when it is finally taken the Secretary of State for Industry will make a statement in the House?

Mr. St. John-Stevas: Consideration of this matter is proceeding. I shall certainly convey to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Industry the fact that the hon. Member does not wish a decision to be taken next week.

Dr. Mawhinney: When may we expect the debate which has been promised on the Williams report? Is my right hon. Friend aware that that report is important to hon. Members of all parties and that it has an effect on my Private Member's Bill? It seems reasonable for the Leader of the House or the appropriate Minister to say that the Government do not support my Bill, but it seems unreasonable for them to say that they cannot form a view because there has not been a debate when it is in their power to call a debate whenever they wish.

Mr. St. John-Steyas: This is a controversial report and my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary is still considering the matter. As he is in the Chamber at present, no doubt he will have heard the anxieties that have been expressed.

Mr. Cryer: Will the Leader of the House make arrangements for an early debate on the textile industry? Is he aware that there has been a serious loss of jobs in this industry and that the antidumping measures of the EEC are pathetically inadequate? Cheap imports are flooding in without—we suspect—adequate quota control. The very serious position of the textile industry is set out in early-day motion No. 546, and clearly there is increasing pressure from all hon. Members who represent textile constituencies for an early debate, because the


textile industry is the third largest employer in the country.

[That this House notes that the United Kingdom had a trade deficit in textile goods of £658 million in 1979 and £131 million in January and February 1980 notes that the textile and clothing industry is the third largest employer in the United Kingdom; that it contains many modernised and efficient sections and good industrial relations; and that the industry is nevertheless facing an increasingly serious erosion of jobs and job opportunities due to the Government policy of a high exchange rate and indifference towards strict enforcement of quota controls and lethargy in seeking new quotas and antidumping measures; and this House therefore calls upon the Government to take measures to secure the short- and longterm future of the textile and clothing industry in at least its present size.]

Mr. St. John-Stevas: Of course I am aware, as are all hon. Members, of the problems of the textile industry. As I said yesterday, there are strict controls on imports from low-cost sources and the Government will continue to enforce vigorously the provisions of the multifibre arrangement. We are ready to take up any case of unfair trading practices when there is evidence that they are taking place. We are committed to ensuring that effective restraints are placed on the imports of clothing and textiles when the present arrangement expires at the end of 1982.

Mr. Kilfedder: Will the Leader of the House consider the urgent need for a debate on the BBC cuts, particularly the scandalous axeing of the BBC Northern Ireland orchestra, which will adversely affect musical teaching and appreciation in the Province?

Mr. St. John-Stevas: The matter of arranging the budget of the BBC is for the governors of the corporation. I have told the governors previously that it would be quite wrong to discriminate against any particular sphere in the cuts, which must be made fairly. I would deplore any discrimination against the arts, particularly music.

Mr. Faulds: When may we expect the announcement of the names of the board of trustees and the chairman of the National Memorial Heritage Fund? Is the right hon. Gentleman—or his lady—

aware that this fund has been losing £6,000 a day since its inception on 1 April because no announcement has yet been made?

Mr. St. John-Stevas: With regard to the hon. Member's mathematics, I do not know that that is necessarily likely to continue. My right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer is looking into that matter.
On the question of the appointment of the trustees, as the hon. Member knows, that is no longer a matter for me. As the Bill was amended, it is now a matter for the Prime Minister and she is considering it at present.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. I propose to call the two hon. Members on the Government Benches and the three hon. Members on the Opposition Benches who have been rising in their places since the beginning of business questions.

Mr. Bidwell: While the Leader of the House eats his hot-cross buns and sips his tea, will he consider the severe impact of the new prescription charges on sick people? Will he consider the possibility of having a debate so that we may propose some modifications in the application of the new charges without necessarily destroying the intentions of the Budget?

Mr. St. John-Stevas: As the Prime Minister has said, the prescription charges are only one-third of the actual average cost that will be enforced by the end of the year, and more than 60 per cent. of those charges are remitted. I shall reflect on what the hon. Member has said, but I must point out that I do not eat hot-cross buns on Maundy Thursday.

Mr. Marlow: If and when the other countries of the Common Market see where their own interests lie and accept the validity of the United Kingdom's case over our budget contribution and the matter is resolved, will there be a debate in the House on the issue?

Mr. St. John-Stevas: I shall certainly consider that suggestion. Meanwhile, it is clear that the initiative taken by my hon. Friend the Prime Minister is progressing well. We have reasonable hopes of a successful outcome in due course.

Mr. Spearing: Since Britain is the leading maritime nation and London is still Britain's leading port, does the right hon. Gentleman acknowledge that the debate on Wednesday 16 April on the Port of London and its present problems will be of great importance? In view of the fact that there may be statements and that a three-hour timetable motion can be discussed beforehand, will the right hon. Gentleman consider tabling a business motion to enable the debate on the Second Reading of the Port of London (Financial Assistance) Bill to go on for at least four hours?

Mr. St. John-Stevas: I shall certainly consider that suggestion. It is precisely because of the importance of the Port of London that I am bringing forward the Bill as early as possible after the recess.

Mr. Nicholas Baker: Does my right hon. Friend consider that Prime Minister's Question Time is a valuable use of the Prime Minister's time? Does he share my sympathy with Opposition Members whose hopeless bowling is hit out of the ground twice a week?

Mr. St. John-Stevas: I can assure my hon. Friend that the. Prime Minister makes excellent use of Question Time. Whether similar good use is made by Members of the Opposition is not for me to say. We must judge by the results.

Mr. McElhone: May I press the right hon. Gentleman for a debate on the Brandt report? He must be aware that last Friday's debate took place in private Member's time and was replied to by the Minister for Trade and not by a responsible Foreign Office Minister. It is essential that we should have a full day's debate or, preferably, a two-day debate to obtain from the Government an explanation of why they say, on the one hand, that the report is very important but, on the other hand, cut the overseas aid programme by 14 per cent.

Mr. St. John-Stevas: The hon. Gentleman knows the importance that the Government attach to aid. The reason why there has to be a reduction is that we do not have, unfortunately, a flourishing and thriving economy as yet. When that is attained, we shall no doubt be able to have a better aid programme. The hon. Gentleman knows my personal interest in the matter. I have done what I can to assist the hon. Gentleman in the matter of aid questions. I do not rule out a future debate. But we have had a recent debate, and it is unreasonable to ask for one at such an early stage.

COUNCIL OF EUROPE AND WESTERN EUROPEAN UNION DELEGATIONS

Mr. Speaker: I undertook yesterday to make a statement following the point of order raised by the hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith) about the delegation to the Council of Europe. After considering the matter again, I can only repeat what I said in the House on 3 April last year, namely, that the point must be pursued with those who are responsible on the Front Bench—apparently, from replies this morning, both Front Benches—and that it is not a matter for me.

Mr. Beith: I thank you, Mr. Speaker, for the consideration that you have given to the matter. I accept your ruling. It clearly comes as a surprise to us that when the House sends hon. Members to present clocks to South Sea Islands we need a resolution of the House, but that in this matter a written question, already tabled before you gave your ruling, should suffice. If it is the case that an executive decision is involved, it must not be pursued with you, but elsewhere. I can only express the hope that the Leader of the House recognises the difficulty in which he has placed us and realises that we cannot co-operate with him if he continues to act in this way.

BRISTOL (DISTURBANCE)

The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. William Whitelaw): With permission, Mr. Speaker, I wish to make a statement. The chief constable of Avon and Somerset has informed me that serious disorder occurred yesterday even-Mg in part of the St. Paul's area of Bristol. The trouble started when police officers visited a club to execute a search warrant in connection with suspected drink and drug offences. A hostile crowd gathered outside the club and threw stones at the police, who were obliged to call for reinforcements.
Police reinforcements arrived, but were heavily outnumbered by the crowd, which had grown to between 200 and 300 and which pelted the police with bricks, stones and bottles. A running fight developed, in which a number of police cars were overturned and set alight.
The chief constable, who had taken personal charge of the operation, decided temporarily to withdraw his officers from the area pending the arrival of further reinforcements. As soon as reinforcements were available, the police moved in with riot shields and secured the area. Order was restored by midnight. The police are continuing to patrol the district to prevent further trouble. During the course of the evening considerable damage was done to shops and other premises. A bank was set on fire. Looting took place.
Some 21 police officers and nine members of the public were injured, none seriously. Twenty-one arrests have been made so far, mainly for looting. It is not yet possible to assess the extent of the damage to property. The chief constable has announced that he is making full inquiries into the incident and I have asked him to report to me urgently. He is in close touch with the local community relations council.

Mr. Merlyn Rees: Is the Home Secretary aware that we welcome a preliminary statement at this stage? In view of the recess, it would have been wrong to leave the matter for 10 days, although I understand the problems of collating information at this early stage. We note the police inquiry. Will the Home Secretary ensure that in some appropriate fashion the investigation and its results

are reported to the House? Does he not agree that whatever we say—it is appropriate that hon. Members should discuss the issue—it is in Bristol that the local problem will be solved?
My recollection is that there is a good record of community relations in Bristol. It is appropriate that hon. Members representing Bristol constituencies are present. I spoke at a late hour last night to my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol North-East (Mr. Palmer), who offers his apologies to the House but feels that it would be better for him to be in the area today. He is talking with people in the St. Paul's area.
It is much too early to make a judgement on the event. I observe, without criticism, that it is difficult for a force to react with extra policemen if it is not organised to deal with untypical situations of this kind. It is vital that there should never be "no-go" areas in this country. The Opposition regret all the injuries reported.
On the question of the proper responsibilities of the House, does the right hon. Gentleman agree that it is time we talked more about the problem of race relations and less about immigration and swamping? Whatever else may be a problem in Bristol, it is not that there are a large number of black British or immigrants in that part of the world. The House must return to the problem of the inner cities and the urban programme, and the replacement of section 11 of the Local Government Act 1966. To cut expenditure in these fields is folly. We shall wish to return to the particular problem of West Indian youth in education and, growingly, in the prisons. The Select Committee report of a year or two ago is a good basis. We shall consider the further report on Bristol when the Home Secretary is able to make it to the House.

Mr. Whitelaw: I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman. In view of the impending recess I was particularly anxious to make this statement at the earliest possible moment. I am sure that the House will understand if all the facts are not available to me. I shall, of course, be prepared to report to the House later. In addition to asking for an urgent report from the chief constable, I have decided to ask the Minister of State—my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury


(Mr. Raison)—to go down to Bristol. He will be there tomorrow. He will be able to see all those concerned and to make an assessment on the spot. I believe that that is the quickest way to get reactions in the area.
I agree with the right hon. Gentleman about the good record in community relations in Bristol. It so happens that my other Minister of State—my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Cleveland (Mr. Brittan)—was recently in Bristol. He found this situation to exist, as did one of my senior officials, who also went to Bristol recently to carry out a study. It was with some regret, and with some surprise, locally and nationally, that this episode occurred. The right hon. Gentleman referred to West Indian youths. He has had that responsibility. I have it today. I fully accept what he says about the need to deal with it.

Mr. David Steel: The whole House must have been shocked to learn of yesterday's serious disturbances, but in view of the inquiries that the Home Secretary has set in train it would be silly to comment on the immediate causes of the disturbances and on some of the press reports.
On the underlying features, the right hon. Gentleman will recall that the Hunt report in 1967 warned the House of the risks of the alienation, particularly among young blacks in the deprived city centres, the areas of high unemployment and poor housing. Is the Home Secretary aware that when I was in Liverpool a year ago I was shocked to find that that alienation exists between young blacks and the police on the streets of that city?
Will the right hon. Gentleman study the success of the experiments where the police have been living in the communities and taking part in community work? Will he try, as the Minister responsible for both the police and community relations, to see that those successful experiments become part of general national policy? I echo what the Opposition spokesman said, namely, that the whole Government, not just the Home Secretary, must be aware that the sharp effects of their economic policy will be felt in those areas.

Mr. Whitelaw: I made a slight error in my previous reply. My hon. Friend the

Minister of State has reminded me that he is going to Bristol today. He will see the circumstances on the ground as soon as he can.
The right hon. Gentleman mentioned the community relations work of the police. I can tell him that the police officer in the area of Bristol involved has been active on the community relations council. He has been one of the most respected members of the council and has done a great deal of the sort of work that the right hon. Gentleman has in mind.

Mr. Waldegrave: We in Bristol are grateful for the speed with which my right hon. Friend has come to the House to make a statement. The incidents mostly started in my constituency and spread to the constituency of the hon. Member for Bristol, North-East (Mr. Palmer), who has asked me to point out that he is now on his way to Bristol.
Everyone concerned, as I have been, with race relations in Bristol would like to emphasise that the disturbances were not a race riot in the simplistic sense of those words. It was not a matter of one community attacking another. It is a difficult policing problem, similar to that which the Metropolitan Police have to face from time to time in South London.
I regret the slight implication in the remarks of the leader of the Liberal Party that he was trying to make a party point out of the matter. The area of Bristol concerned is a housing action area into which great resources have been put, although more resources must undoubtedly be provided. Simplistic statements in a complex situation will not help those of us in Bristol who will have to rebuild community relations and trust between the police and the West Indian community.
I do not want to prejudge the issue, but may I ask whether my right hon. Friend would be willing to call a public inquiry when he has in due course received information from the chief constable?

Mr. Whitelaw: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. As we have seen elsewhere, there is, after such incidents, an important job of rebuilding trust between the local communities and the police. Police action in any community depends on support from that community, and trust must be


rebuilt at the earliest opportunity. I agree with what my hon. Friend said about the resources that have been put into the Bristol area.
As to the possibility of a further inquiry, I have indicated that I shall receive a full and urgent report from the chief constable. I have heard my hon. Friend's comments and I shall listen carefully to what Bristol Members have to say. When we have considered ail that, we shall decide what further action might be appropriate.

Mr. Benn: May I join in thanking the Home Secretary for making a prompt statement, but ask whether he is aware that our concern is all the greater because Bristol has such a fine record, not only in community relations but on law and order generally?
I reinforce what the hon. Member for Bristol, West (Mr. Waldegrave) said about the need for a public inquiry to bring out all the evidence and all that lies behind the circumstances. Clearly it was not a race riot, as has been made clear, and, as we know from other parts of the United Kingdom, violence is not necessarily confined to areas where there are immigrant communities. It is important that relations between the police and all the communities should be brought out and considered.
It is not fair to ask the police to carry a burden that arises, in part, from rising unemployment, social deprivation and other circumstances in our urban areas and which affect our communities as a whole, not only the ethnic communities.
May I reinforce the need for an inquiry in which all the evidence can be brought out and with terms of reference that are wide enough to enable recommendations to be made covering a wide range of problems?

Mr. Whitelaw: I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman. I profoundly agree that all the evidence suggests that it was not in any sense a race riot. It is correct to say that.
On the question of a full and public inquiry, of course I shall consider carefully what the right hon. Gentleman has said, but I believe that it is right first to receive the reports and messages that he and other hon. Members from the area will wish to give me. In asking for a

public inquiry, the right hon. Gentleman has given a clear indication of some of the difficulties involved in deciding exactly what is required. He has called for a wide inquiry. I believe that it is right to get the initial reactions first, and then to decide what is best. I certainly do not rule out anything of that nature later.

Mr. J. Enoch Powell: Was the right hon. Gentleman surprised by these events? If not, why not?

Mr. Whitelaw: Yes, I was surprised, because I was told that community relations in this part of Bristol were good. Bristol Members, who should know, as they represent the city, were also surprised. If they were surprised, why should I not have been? I was surprised. I deeply regret what happened, and I hope that we shall do all that we can to ensure that such incidents do not occur again.

Mr. Eldon Griffiths: As one who hopes that this is an isolated case, but who fears, on evidence, that it may be the first of many, may I ask my right hon. Friend urgently to consider extending the inter-departmental discussions on violence on public transport into the wider question of violence arising in areas of deprivation and racial difficulties?
Does my right hon. Friend agree that, if one thing is demonstrated in Bristol, it is the necessity to have in urban areas where there is tension a reserve force, or some form of special patrol group, which can be moved into action swiftly to deal with riots and arson?

Mr. Whitelaw: In all matters concerned with public order it is right to consider what further action should be taken. On the wider front of public order as a whole, I have promised to publish a Green Paper shortly, and that will be done. I am also discussing, and having a conference with those concerned, violence on the London underground and on railways generally. I am prepared to consider what further discussions we should have on those broader problems.
On the question of the police position and their tactics, we must wait to hear the report from the chief constable and must place great weight on his operational judgment. He is the man on the spot. It is important to add that he was able quickly to call on reinforcements from


surrounding forces. That has been an important part of police co-operation, which I greatly welcome.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. To be fair to those with Adjournment debates, I propose to call three more hon. Members from each side of the House before moving on.

Sir Ronald Bell: Is it not the case that when there is an area in a town that can be identified as an area of immigrant or coloured population—and such areas are increasing in number—this sort of incident is particularly likely to arise? In the light of some of the remarks made in the past 12 hours, will my right hon. Friend confirm that there is in this country only one law and that it should be enforced by the police equally against all citizens, who should conform with it and not request special consideration or mitigations of the general law?

Mr. Whitelaw: Of course it is true that every citizen of this country is subject to the law equally. It is important to state that. As for the position of the police, I think that the House will agree that, in view of the casualties that they suffered during the course of the evening, it is clear that individual police officers showed both courage and considerable coolness in ensuring that order was restored without serious injury or loss of life.

Mr. Clinton Davis: Will the Home Secretary take an early opportunity to make a further statement to the House about the general relations between the police and the immigrant communities in the deprived city areas? It is a most important and urgent matter.
Because insurance policies often exclude liability for riot, and the procedure for claiming compensation from the police authority is restricted, in terms of time scale, will the Home Secretary—the final arbiter in these matters, under the regulations—consider giving directions to the police authority in question, and perhaps in other cases, to extend the time in which claims for compensation can be made, and also to permit costs to be awarded to those seeking to make such claims?

Mr. Whitelaw: On the hon. Gentleman's second point, I am grateful to him because he gave me notice of his question, which is of a detailed nature. It is a matter about which he has a specialist knowledge. I understand that in the first instance all claims are naturally against the police authority. I shall consider the other points that he raised on that subject.
On the hon. Gentleman's first point, I appreciate the need for constant work to improve relations between the police and the various communities in these areas. That work will continue, and I shall give it every possible support.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: In the interests of maintaining good community relations throughout the country, will my right hon. Friend make an urgent appeal to the BBC and the ITV to the effect that if they intend to flood today's programmes with interviews with extremist and militant so-called leaders of the immigrant communities, they should also interview representatives of the great majority of immigrants who deplore violence and vandalism as much as anybody else?

Mr. Whitelaw: I appreciate my hon. Friend's remarks. I take this opportunity to welcome him back to the House. I have not had the chance to do so before.
I hope that in all their programmes the television companies will be careful to pursue a proper balance between those whom they may wish to interview on this issue. In that connection, if they wish to ask me any questions about the matter I shall be available to answer them.

Mr. Tilley: Is the Home Secretary aware that social unrest is increasing in many of the inner cities, largely because of the despair felt by black and white youngsters about their chances of finding a decent job? It is an impossible task to simply ask the police to hold down that position.
Government action is needed. Will the Government take what has happened at Bristol as a warning that unless they reverse the cuts in the inner city programme they are taking a risk that in all our cities, including London, we shall have a British action replay of the American inner city tragedy?

Mr. Whitelaw: I note the hon. Gentleman's remarks. What he is putting forward goes far wider than my particular responsibilities. I am aware of the importance of employment in all these areas.

Mr. Brotherton: Did my right hon Friend hear a broadcast this morning by the chief constable, in which he admitted that for some hours last night there was a "no go" area for the police in Bristol? Will he assure the public that steps will be taken to ensure that such "no go" areas never occur again?

Mr. Whitelaw: I have already said that I wish to await a full report from the chief constable on all the circumstances of the evening. We must place great weight on the operational judgment of the chief constable. He was the man on the spot. He had to cope with the position as it was. It is important to say that he did so without loss of life or serious injury. That must go some way towards justifying his action at the time.

Mr. Faulds: Is it not important that the comments of the hon. Members who represent Bristol should be heard from the House? Do not the reports point to the fact that this situation was not one of racial confrontation, because the firemen in the area were not attacked, nor were the whites, but that it seems to have blown up, unfortunately, from the police-black community attitudes.
Finally, may I ask the Home Secretary—I do not know the answer, which is why I am asking him—where the chief constable served before he went to Avon, because he has only recently arrived in the area?

Mr. Whitelaw: I agree that the chief constable has recently arrived in the area. Suddenly, off the cuff, I cannot remember where he served previously. When I cannot remember something, the only answer

is to say so. I do not think that it is important, because I have every confidence in him. Equally, I know that the right hon. Member for Leeds, South (Mr. Rees) knows the chief constable. He has already spoken, and I think that I can quote him as saying that he had considerable confidence in the chief constable.
From all that we have heard on the radio, it would appear that what the hon. Gentleman has said is right. It is early to jump to too many conclusions.

BILL PRESENTED

FILMS

Mr. Secretary Nott, supported by Mr. Secretary Younger, Mr. Norman St. JohnStevas, Mr. Timothy Raison, Mr. Nicholas Ridley, Mr. Nigel Lawson and Mr. Norman Tebbit, presented a Bill to amend the enactments relating to the financing and exhibition of films: And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time upon Monday 14 April and to be printed [Bill 190.]

STATUTORY INSTRUMENTS. &c

Motion made, and Question put forthwith pursuant to Standing Order No. 73A (Standing Committee on Statutory Instruments, &amp;c.)

CIVIL AVIATION

That the draft British Airways Board (Borrowing Powers) Order 1980, which was laid before this House on 19 March be approved.—[Mr. Cope]

Question agreed to.

EASIER ADJOURNMENT DEBATES

Mr. Speaker: Before I call the first hon. Member, I should indicate that the first debate should finish at 12 o'clock. I made allowances when I gave the time allocation for the first debate.

FORESTRY COMMISSION

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Cope.]

Mr. Gavin Strang: I am grateful for the opportunity to raise this important issue today. There is continuing concern about the effects of the Government's public expenditure policies on the forestry industry in general and especially towards the future role and importance of the Forestry Commission.
It is common ground in the House—it has been for many years—that the Forestry Commission represents an important national asset. Since it was established following the Acland Committee in 1919, the commission has made a tremendous contribution to our national economy through the afforestation of many acres of our land, through its sponsorship of the private sector, and as the source of advice on forestry matters to successive Governments.
I wish to concentrate on the role of the commission as a State industry. It is necessary to say a few words to put the current attitudes towards the commission in a wider context. The case for growing more trees has become stronger rather than weaker in recent years. I am glad to see my hon. Friend the Member for Dagenham (Mr. Parker) in the House, because he has taken an interest in this subject over many more years than I have. He has argued this case for decades. I think that he would agree that all the evidence suggests that towards the end of this century and beyond the demand for timber will outstrip supply.
There are many sources of evidence to support that statement. I believe that the most authoritative statement is the Forestry Commission's own document "The Wood Production Outlook in Britain", which was published in 1977. Following that, there has been the World Forestry Congress in Jakarta, which expressed great concern about the trends in relation to demand and supply of timber throughout the world. There is also the report of the Centre for Agricultural Strategies, "A Strategy for the United Kingdom Forest Industry".
I hope that the Government are prepared to agree with that large body of

evidence that it is apparently in the national interest to increase our investment in and commitment to the forestry industry.
As we know, this country produces only about 8 per cent. of its timber requirements. Forestry wood products and wood represent a substantial import burden of about £2,700 million a year.
Forestry is a long-term investment. That is probably why Governments of both parties have not attached to it the importance that the national interest demands. The timber that is now being harvested by the Forestry Commission was planted in the 1920s and 1930s. Thanks to the foresight of Governments then, a substantial amount of timber is available for harvesting today. If Governments in the days of depression could be far-sighted enough to make such an investment, surely, with all the benefits of North Sea oil, it is not too much to ask the Government to have a similar commitment to investment in forestry.
The investment that we make today will be harvestable when North Sea oil is exhausted. A small fraction of revenue from North Sea oil could be invested in this important renewable resource for the benefit of the generations that will come when North Sea oil has run out.
I am anxious in particular about the level of new planting. Both the private and State sectors have an important role. I acknowledge that there was a sharp and regrettable decline in the level of private investment in timber when the last Labour Government were in office.
Many people argue that that was a consequence of the capital transfer tax provisions. I did not and do not believe that that was the only consideration. More important was the market in wood and wood products. If the tax regime generally and capital transfer tax in particular were significant factors, it is reassuring that the substantial package on tax concessions and increased and new grants for the forestry sector, announced in March 1977, appears to be having some effect.
I read with pleasure the 1978–79 report from the Forestry Commission. Paragraph 86 states:
we are pleased to report that the return of confidence to which we looked forward last year, following the improvements to the support arrangements for private forestry introduced in 1977, is now becoming evident.


Planting in the private sector increased for the first time for some years. Although this is still well below the levels achieved in the peak years of the early 'seventies, the interest currently being shown in the Commission's grant-aid schemes, if maintained, would indicate that the upward trend in planting will continue over the next few years.
It is fair to conclude that the private sector is reasonably buoyant.
My prime concern is the public sector. I am very worried about the medium-to long-term outlook for new planting by the commission. That worry is more than confirmed by the Government's White Paper on public expenditure, published on Budget day. The White Paper states, of forestry:
Planned public expenditure from 1980–81 onwards has been cut by between £5 million and £6 million annually,
The new public expenditure provision will allow for new planting by the Forestry Enterprise of some 11,000 hectares a year from 1980–81 onwards".

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Jerry Wiggin): In order to avoid too many statistics, perhaps I can inform the hon. Gentleman that the 1980–81 programme involves 12,900 hectares, of which 11,600 will be in Scotland.

Mr. Strang: I do not intend to quote many statistics. I was quoting the new planting figure in the Government's White Paper. Perhaps the Minister includes restocking in his figures.
I regret that there has been a significant decline in the level of planting by the Forestry Commission in recent years. However, there is a prospect of a reversal in the decline. The level of land acquisition is crucial. In the year 1979–80 the commission acquired about 8,500 hectares of land, at a cost of £3·3 million. That represents a significant increase on the previous year.
In 1980–81 the commission plans to spend only about £1 million on new land acquisitions. According to the White Paper, funds for land acquisition are to be reduced. That means that the commission will run out of new land for planting. If there is a new planting rate of 11,000 hectares—which is too low—and the commission acquires less than that per annum, it will begin to run out of land for new planting towards the end of the decade.
I accept that not only the Ministry of Agriculture is involved. The Treasury has a big part to play in the determination of decisions, particularly on the likely levels of planting and acquisition.
Manpower is an important element of public expenditure. I have an interest, in that I give advice to the Civil Service Union. The commission has already started to take some worrying decisions. If those decisions represent the beginning of what is to be become the Government's overall approach to this important national asset, there are grounds for considerable anxiety.
The Government's stated policy is to reduce the size of the Civil Service. That involved a cut of 3 per cent. in the commission's manpower, achieved by December 1979. There is to be another cut of 5 per cent. We are therefore talking of a cut of over 8 per cent. in commision manpower.
The commission is a source of advice to the Government. It manages grants to the private sector and it is a nationalised industry. It is being treated as if it were simply another Civil Service Department. No one suggests that the electricity, gas or coal industries should make manpower cuts.
About 8,250 people are employed by the commission. About 6,000 of them are industrial employees and can be regarded as wealth producers. Among the 2,500 non-industrial employees are about 1,000 State foresters—the middle management. These are productive people.
I do not want to push this analogy too far. The Minister understands what I am getting at. These people are more comparable, as it were, with miners and colliery overmen than with civil servants in the Departments of Trade and of Health and Social Security. It is very worrying that the commission should be treated in that way and that sufficient importance is not attached to its role as a State enterprise.
I mention in this context that a Rayner project is under way in the Forestry Commission. As has been done in the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food—as the Parliamentary Secretary knows—it is looking at the numbers of commission employees involved in the administration of grants to the private sector. Given that that is going on, it


is monstrous that these cuts in manpower are being attempted.
In recent years the commission has had almost total responsibility for the planting of shrubs—I use that word loosely—in the afforestation of the roadsides of new trunk and motorway schemes. I understand that the commission has taken on this work because the Ministry of Transport and other Departments involved found that it was the most efficient enterprise and the best placed to carry it out. But a decision has been taken that although the commission will continue to manage and oversee this work it will no longer be carried out by commission direct labour; it will be done by outside private contractors.
I challenge the Government on this matter. I have received undertakings from the Minister of State, Civil Service Department—as have other hon. Members and the union concerned—that work will not be hived off, as it were, solely on doctrinaire grounds but will have to be justified on grounds of efficiency or greater cost-effectiveness. There are grounds for believing that in that instance it is a doctrinaire decision, a privatisation—a horrible word that has crept into our jargon in the last few months—and that it will not be more efficient and cost-effective.
I do not expect the Parliamentary Secretary to talk at length on that matter today, but I hope that he will consider it and give an assurance that the undertakings repeatedly given by Ministers in this connection will be adhered to and that there will be no question of hiving off this work for the sake of it, in order to achieve cuts in manpower when no real savings are involved.
One of the consequences of the current approach being adopted to manpower in the Forestry Commission is that more and more of the work force is being deployed from planting and maintenance to harvesting. I welcome the levels of output being achieved on the harvesting side, but there is a source of genuine concern that the numbers involved in planting and in research will be significantly reduced in the years ahead.
I advised the hon. Gentleman's office that in this connection I would refer to the position at Fort William as it is important to Scotland. The hon. Gentle-

man will be aware of the importance that the chemical pulp mill assumed in the Highlands economy and of the great concern when Wiggins Teape announced the closing down of the mill. Indeed, it has been closed now for some time.
I understand that a Canadian company—Consolidated Bathurst Incorporated—and Wiggins Teape are planning a major investment of £100 million in a newsprint mill at Fort William and that the decision may be taken by the early summer. The Forestry Commission has a part to play here in giving reasonable undertakings on the supply of timber, as have the private sector and the unions on working practice, but the Government also have an important part to play.
I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will be able to give an undertaking not only to the people at Fort William but to the forestry industry in the Highlands and in Scotland generally that the Government attach the highest importance to making a success of this proposed investment and will be prepared to do what they can to give it the necessary support.
I congratulate the Forestry Commission on its tremendous achievement on the amenity and environmental side. On occasions I have derived great pleasure from picnicking in some of the commission's forests. The commission has set a European example with what it has achieved in many of the forests that it has developed. Hundreds of thousands of people in urban areas derive great benefit and enjoyment from the commission's investment in this area. The previous Labour Government and the Government before them had already taken a decision that this aspect should be encouraged in the national interest. Therefore, if my information is correct I find it disturbing that, as part of this cutback in the commission, new amenity, environmental and recreational projects have been almost if not completely halted.
I believe that there has been a bipartisan policy towards forestry during the last two decades. Conservative Members would say that the previous Labour Government, through their taxation regime, were too hard on the private sector. All right; I shall not argue about that. But, on the figures, the 1977 package was not only generous; it was appreciated by the industry and seems to have led to


some extent to a resurgence in the level of planting activity. It would be sad and against the national interest if we were to see a sharp movement away from this bipartisan policy and there were to be a downgrading of the importance of the commission as an investor, producer and creator of our national wealth.
This is not a doctrinaire view. The British Paper and Board Industry Federation, in a statement issued last month, said:
The Forestry Commission, with its sound commercial and harvesting resources, has greatly assisted in providing long-term stability, controlled development and continuity of supply, and its future is essential to complement the private sector in any future policy.
On 1 November the Parliamentary Secretary gave me an assurance that the commission would not be sacrificed as part of the Government's public expenditure cuts. I have sought to argue that there is already cause for concern, first, in relation to the approach towards manpower and, secondly, in relation to the Government's White Paper on public expenditure. The Minister of State, in reply to the debate in the other place last week, said that the Government were undertaking a fundamental review and that a dialogue was taking place between the commission and the Government on the future of forestry policy.
I urge the Government not to go down the road of privatisation policy—an extreme policy—or to depart from the policy of successive Gevernments to support the commission. The case for investment by the commission in the forestry industry is getting stronger. I hope that the Government will acknowledge that.

Mr. John Parker: I support what has been said by my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Strang). It is most important that some of the revenues from North Sea oil should be used to finance the forestry industry, not only because the trees will be there when the oil begins to run out but because trees are a replaceable asset, and more trees can be planted as they are used up.
The Reading report about the future of forestry has recently been published. It has made much of the point that in the next half century, whilst resources are

likely to be dropping and prices rising, the various alternative sources of supply are likely to be much fewer. Therefore, it is all the more important that we should have our own source of supply.
I do not want to go into this point at great length, but I must point out that the Reading report suggests that we ought to have an all-party policy on an agreed programme of planting that would not be interrupted, as happened under both of the previous two Governments, who interrupted the general progress of the industry.
It is interesting to note that the pension funds, which have to invest with the best thoughts about the future, are now beginning to invest in forestry. It it indicative that the return will be coming to them at the time when they want to pay out their pensions, that is, in the early part of the next century.
We shall be seeing a world shortage of timber and an increase in price. That will mean an increased disadvantage, from our point of view, to our balance of payments. Therefore, we should be increasing supplies in Britain not only for that reason but because timber-using industries will be facing increased competition from foreign firms sending their finished products here—timber and paper, and so on—rather than our importing timber as a raw material to be turned into manufactures here. Therefore, it is in the interests of the timber-using industries as well that there should be increased planting here.
I hope that this will be a joint programme of public and private forestry. It is important that there should be a split between the two and co-operation between the two, and there should be backing for the policy of doubling the hectarage under forestry in the next 50 years. Once accepted, such a programme should go ahead irrespective of changes of Government.
I do not want to trespass too much on the time available for the Minister's reply. However, there is one other point in this connection. We give grants for hill sheep farming. Why should we not encourage hill farmers also to afforest strips of land? Should we not have special schemes, with the same kind of contributions, for creating shelter belts on


steep bits of land that cannot otherwise be cultivated? Should we not encourage land owners and ensure that agricultural colleges instruct young farmers in forestry and advances in it? That is where there should be an increased effort and where Government policy could enter into the matter.
I hope that we shall soon have a report from the Government on what they intend to do about the Reading report. When that is produced, I hope that there will be discussions between the two Front Benches so that we have an agreed policy to go ahead for 50 years without interruptions when changes of Government occur.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Jerry Wiggin): As is traditional, I start by congratulating the hon. Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Strang) on raising this subject. As the House knows, the other place had a lengthy debate on this matter last week. It is appropriate and timely that forestry should be debated in both Houses since I think that this is the first occasion on which the matter has been raised since the present Government took office.
The hon. Member for Dagenham (Mr. Parker), with his long-standing interest in forestry, mentioned the Reading report, as did the hon Member for Edinburgh, East. My view is much the same as that of the hon. Member for Edinburgh, East, which is that the Forestry Commission document "The Wood Production Outlook in Britain" is in many respects more authoritative and, I think, more deeply argued. However, there is little difference between the two in their general concepts and on the need for a continuing programme of forestry expansion in this country for the purposes of producing wood, providing jobs in rural areas and the wood processing industry, and reducing our large dependence on imported timber.
Nice as it would be to debate the general subject at length, time does not permit. Therefore, I think that I should deal with some of the more detailed and specific points that the hon. Gentleman raised in the context of such matters as

constraints on public expenditure and on manpower.
I should like, however, to echo what my noble Friend the Minister of State, Scottish Office said in the debate on forestry in another place on 26 March. The Government are in favour of continuing expansion of forestry in this country and we welcome the contribution that further planting would make towards easing some of the problems identified by the two reports that I have just mentioned. But the further expansion of forestry raises a number of fundamental questions, the answers to which have long-term implications beyond the confines of forestry and cannot be reached hastily. Although we are pursuing our present review of forestry policy with vigour, it is something that we cannot skimp, as we want to be certain that the policy that emerges is positive and constructive and provides an acceptable balance, given the limited land and other resources available to us.
The balance of the future afforestation effort between the public and private sectors is clearly an important part of the equation and one that can, of course, be approached differently, depending upon one's political viewpoint. That balance has tipped one way and the other over the years, and it is now, as the latest planting figures show, tipping towards a more significant private sector investment in forestry. It is not the Government's intention, however, to dissolve the successful partnership between the Forestry Commission and private woodland interests.
In spite of what the hon. Gentleman said, the fact is that the commission is, to all intents and purposes, a Government Department. Like other Government Departments, it must take a share of the reductions in public expenditure and manpower to which the Government are fully committed. Indeed, from the tenor of the hon. Gentleman's remarks I would assume that he saw the commission, perhaps, more as a nationalised industry. Indeed, that is a point that is worth looking into. We would consider this as we would consider many other propositions, in looking at the very substantial public investment over the years and the very large assets now employed by the commission. I think that the hon. Gentleman's point is a reasonable one for debate and investigation.
These expenditure and manpower cuts have been tailored to meet the circumstances of each Department, and in the case of the Forestry Commission we fully recognise its revenue-producing role and the importance of maintaining its capacity to harvest the growing volume of timber now available as its post-war plantations mature.
The commission has had a good record of productivity over the past decade. At a time when its estate has continued to expand and its timber production has more than doubled, its industrial labour force has been reduced by nearly one-third and its supervisory and administrative staff by about 16 per cent.
Reductions of that order clearly cannot be sustained. Mechanisation of forestry has made an important contribution and has now achieved some of its effect. But, for an efficient organisation, as I believe the commission is, expenditure and manpower reductions of the order required recently should be capable of being absorbed without an unacceptable effect upon the discharge of its main responsibilities.
Nevertheless, it is fair to say that as the demand for staff to harvest timber in the forthcoming years grows, so I shall certainly be prepared to argue that it will be necessary, given the commercial constraints and the attitude that the Government naturally have to such matters, to see that in order to maintain its efficiency the commission has adequate staff to reap the harvest that it has sown. The commission has indicated that it expects to be able to make the current economies while maintaining its present estate in good order, as well as its harvesting, and thus its earning revenue capability.
About half the public expenditure reductions will fall on the commission's land acquisition budget, which has been cut this year from £3½ million to £1 million. I accept that the hon. Member for Edinburgh, East regards that as a retrograde step, but I fail to see how he can reconcile that attitude with the fact that the previous Labour Government lopped £1·6 million off the commission's acquisition budget in 1977–78 and restored it in full to the previous figure of £3 million only in the financial year just ended. The land market is notoriously volatile, and I remind the hon. Member that in the

year when the Government of which he was a member were making their expenditure cuts—I wish that they had seen them through—the amount of plantable land on the market was such that the commission found it difficult to spend the reduced figure allocated to it for land acquisitions.
The current year's figure of £1 million, however, will be capable of variation, in so far as we have agreed that the commission may retain 50 per cent. of any revenues from the sale of surplus properties, over and above its survey figure of £1·4 million. Thus, the commission has every incentive to fulfil the Government's call to maximise its disposals effort. That arrangement will apply only to the current year, but in the next three years of the public expenditure survey period the commission's acquisition funds will be increased to an average of £2 million per annum. That might limit the expansion of our forests if the Commission were the sole bidder for forestry land, but that is not the case. Private interests have shown a growing readiness to invest in forestry over the past two years, and I am confident that little, if any, land offered in the market for forestry will be left unplanted as a result of the present retrenchment in the public sector.
As the hon. Member for Dagenham said, there is a growing awareness of the desirability of investment in forestry, and the nature of the reward and return is becoming apparent to many financial institutions, some of which have taken the trouble to inform me of their future interests.
Another main area of expenditure and manpower reductions will fall on the administration head, rising from £0·25 million to over £1 million by 1983–84. Apart from a marginal reduction in the commission's research activity, the main cut will fall on administrative staff at headquarters and in the regions. That may call for some difficult decisions. In common with other Departments, the commission is looking for ways of increasing efficiency. One example could be in the administration of private woodlands grants and felling licensing procedures, in respect of which the commission is shortly to complete a scrutiny under the guidance of Sir Derek Rayner.
The commission has also decided to call a halt, for the time being, to any


new recreational projects, such as camp sites, forest trails and picnic sites, which will save upwards of £1 million per year. The remaining expenditure under this head will cover the maintenance of existing facilities. There will be no cutback in those facilities merely a stop on any additions. That must be right at a time of acute economic difficulties. The commission has an excellent record in this field, which has brought it much credit and has served as an example for others to follow, and it will continue to maintain its present high standards. There will also be significant expenditure savings—up to £750,000 by 1983–84—in fertilising and in the protection of plantations against predators, and so on. The commission has been careful, however, to ensure that the less intensive management involved in the short term will not have any harmful effects over the full period of the crop.
Expenditure—including staff—on new planting operations will be reduced. This year the savings will be £0·45 million, with the new planting programme falling by 1,000 hectares from last year's level, to 12,900 hectares. It is realistic to cut the commission's new planting programme to this lower figure because the depressed land market of recent years has resulted in its reserves of plantable land being eroded. In the following three years the new planting programme will fall by about 2,000 hectares, resulting in savings in 1983–84 of £0·9 million. The balance of plantable land on the market should, with the renewed confidence in the private sector, still go to forestry.
The hon. Gentleman will be pleased to learn, however, that that will still leave a substantial acreage of plantable reserves in the ownership of the commission. I am satisfied that this policy will not do any long-term damage. The maximum expansion will, of course, continue, with the commission retaining a significant share, although there will be a philosophical difference between Conservative and Labour Members as to whether that should be the proportion between the private and public sectors.
Previous planning programmes have proved over-optimistic. For example, in 1970·71 the total planting by the commission was 28,400 hectares. By 31 March 1979 the total had fallen to 15,400

hectares, in spite of the programme that was set in 1974 for 22,000 hectares a year. We should see that in the light of history and not be too critical if the programme is now being made more realistic.
There are other constraints, such as the availablity of land and the wish of the environmentalists to see that forestry does not harm the countryside. Those factors are increasingly infringing upon the acquisition programme of the commission, as they are of the private sector. This is a difficult area, on which the Government must concentrate. There are other minor savings in forest road improvement programmes, replacement of vehicles, and so on, which can be achieved without unduly impairing efficiency in the short term.
At this point I should like to mention the recent pay settlement that was agreed between the Forestry Commission and the unions for its forest workers. The settlement was concluded with a speed which does credit to both sides. The commission was able to pay the arrears from 21 January 1980 resulting from the settlement in the last financial year, rather than in 1980–81, as expected. That means that the 1980–81 cash limit for the Forestry Commission presented to Parliament on 26 March, in the sum of £40,133,000, which included provision for the arrears, will be reduced by £506,000 to take account of this, and a revised 1980–81 Estimate will be submitted to Parliament at the appropriate time.

Mr. Strang: Is the Minister aware that the latest pay settlement apparently means that for the first time—certainly in my recollection—the forestry workers will be paid a rate for the job that brings them below the legal minimum that applies as a result of the agricultural wages board determination in the private sector. I have not examined the amounts for pensions, but it has been suggested to me that, as a consequence of the cash limits, the settlement was bad from the point of view of the industrial workers in the commission. I hope that the Minister will look into the matter at a later date.

Mr. Wiggin: Obviously I am aware of the background, and I hope I have the facts right when I say that that is a deliberate policy by the commission to ensure that its workers are paid the same


on either side of the border. The difficulty arises from the fact that wage council settlements in Scotland are at a different level from those in England. The hon. Gentleman is correct in saying that in order to maintain a salary structure some employees had to receive a little less and others a little more. That was the intention. I think that he will accept that there would be difficulties if two men doing the same job—one in Scotland and the other in England or Wales—were paid at substantially different rates.

Mr. Strang: They should be paid more.

Mr. Wiggin: It would be good if we could pay everyone double, ourselves included, but we cannot afford it. It is vitally important that the commercial aspects of operations are considered in forestry.
I am aware of the negotiations that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland—who has responsibility for the matter—is carrying out in regard to Fort William. The Forestry Commission can make a substantial contribution to the welfare of the whole nation, but particularly to employment in Scotland. If at the end of the day the matter becomes one of social benefit to Scotland, the commission should say so. The matter should be seen and identified for what it is. There is a contribution to be made in that regard. The Government have much good will towards it, and I hope that they will be able to help.
The commission is staffed by some very dedicated people, and I am sure that under its new chairman and its vigorous director-general it will continue successfully to fulfil its dual role as both forestry enterprise and forestry authority.

SCHOOLS (TEACHING VALUES)

12 noon

Mr. Harry Greenway: There can be no more suitable time than in Holy Week, and Maundy Thursday in particular, to look at the question of the teaching of values in schools. In my view, and regrettably in my experience, there has been a serious decline in the teaching of religious education in recent years. The figures that I received from my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State this week show that there are fewer specialist teachers of that subject. Many schools—primary but especially secondary—have no specialist head of department for religious education or religious studies, call it what one will, and very often there is no department.
There has been an enormous change in the style of school assemblies, which under the 1944 Act were intended to be acts of worship. I do not believe that we can simply ignore the fact that the law, in the form of the 1944 Act, is being ignored in so many schools, which it certainly is.
The act of worship in a school is of the highest value to the school itself. But today, in as many as 90 per cent. of schools—I am open to correction, and I would be happy to learn that the figure is not as high as that—some morning assemblies at best consist of a homily. That may well be a good way of conducting an assembly and putting a point across, but after a time a homily day after day from a headmaster or a teacher, however gifted, tends to fall on deaf years.
Many schools often run a quiz instead of an assembly, which can include many different subjects in order to achieve variety. Other schools arrange talks by outside people. Very often those can be successful, but they are frequently not linked to teaching values or to putting those values across to the children. I believe that assemblies should basically achieve that purpose.
Classes are often asked to perform playlets and plays at assembly. They are useful forms of self-expression and can be a means of fulfilment. But all too frequently they do not put across a concept of values, which is what I believe the school assembly exists to do. All sorts of

things happen in many schools, except the necessary teaching about God, Christendom and our own culture which is essential for the well-being of society.
The age in which we live is said to be difficult, and it is. I accept that to some extent it is difficult for schools not to reflect society. However, they are educational institutions whose fundamental role is teaching, and I hope that the debate will remind them of that duty. Positive teaching, including Christ's great teachings and those of other world religions, if it comes to that—including the Bible and the Koran—can go well in assemblies. The children of today, like the children of the past, are interested in hearing what the great spiritual leaders have to say and have said. They want to know about it and to argue about it. Therefore, they should be told.
The weakness of some churches in teaching the children who attend them—and there are not always many who do—is part of the problem to which I should like to draw attention. Many children go to church and receive no teaching at all which is of any value about the religion which they and their parents follow. That means that there is a further serious gap in the teaching of values to modern society.
I believe and fear that a vacuum is being created. Who wants it? Of course, the Marxists want it. If there is no teaching of values from Christian or other religious points of view, a vacuum is created into which the Marxists are only too ready to dive, as we all know. There is great concern among parents about that.
We know from the polls—and I have conducted some myself—that more than 80 per cent. of parents want religious education for their children. They desire that not because they want their children to be indoctrinated in any way but merely to have the opportunity of understanding the values of our great and living religion. The children should be free to accept or reject those values, but they must be told what those values are.
The value of the ethos of the school assembly is enormous. It has the effect of bringing a school together, as my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State will know from his long, remarkable and greatly respected experience. I am sure that commends itself to everyone who


knows anything about schools. I know that there are sizeable ethnic minorities in many modern schools. Some people make this fact an excuse for ducking the teaching of values and the teachings outlined in the 1944 Act. The excuse is that it would be offensive to ethnic minorities. However, nothing could be further from the truth. Anyway, is it not fair to say that ethnic minorities, whichever they are, must accept the host country's culture, at any rate in schools? They do not have to believe it, but they must accept that it is the basis upon which our schools and society are run.
This does not mean that such minorities should fail to keep their own cultures and faiths alive or to practise and follow them, as so many do. In Ealing, the Polish and Asian communities are very strong. They follow their own cultures. However, in the context of schools, I believe that such minorities will accept that the values which are put across are those of Christendom. In any case, the values of Christendom closely correspond to the values of many of the other world religions which are followed by the Asian and other ethnic minorities.
I should like to say a word about the value of denominational schools and the need to expand and support them. The borough of Ealing faces challenges such as one would not believe in an attempt to establish a Church of England high school on the site of the present Twyford high school. The population in the area is falling rapidly. Three schools at present serve that declining population. Parents are no longer choosing the Twyford school in the same numbers as they once did. Ten years ago, the school was reasonably well subscribed, but it has not for some years been a very popular school, and this year only 75 first choice preferences have been received for 240 places. Therefore, I believe that parents are indicating this year, as they did last year—when only about 100 first choice preferences were received—that the school is one which the area would be prepared to see closed.
I therefore believe it right to establish a new school in that building. The Conservative-controlled borough council was elected on a mandate to establish a Church of England high school in the borough. In Ealing, the parents of 2,600 children have said that they want them to go to a Church of England high school

within the next few years. That figure represents roughly 10 per cent. of the borough's children. Most of them belong to Christian worshipping families, although not all are Church of England. Many now attend Church of England first and middle schools in the borough. They come from all sorts of backgrounds.
For example, there are the railway community of North Acton, the Christian Asian community of Southall, the new housing areas of Northolt and Green-ford and the West Indian community. In short, they come from all areas and groups within the borough of Ealing. The idea is well supported by members of all ethnic minorities.
The Roman Catholic Church currently has a fully comprehensive system. The Church of England wishes to establish such a system but faces tremendous opposition, principally from the Labour Party. It amazes me that the national executive committee of the Labour Party has seen fit to interfere in this decision and has set up the strongest possible opposition to it. Shadow Cabinet Ministers have been to Ealing and spoken against the proposal. We have had more interference on this issue, which is very much a domestic issue, than one could possibly imagine.
I heard today from my hon. Friend the Minister that the section 13 notice procedure which has to be operated before the establishment of this school, and which does not invite supporters of the proposed new school to write in, invites only opponents to write in. Up to 26 March, three days before the closing date for representations on the proposed Church of England high school, we had no fewer than 9,970 signatures on the petition in favour of the proposal and 5,147 against. I hope that the Secretary of State will take those figures strongly to heart when reaching his decision. I hope that he will recognise that the emotion and dedication that lie behind those figures are vital to the widening of parental choice in Ealing and the maintenance of the teaching of values in our schools and all that goes with them.
It is said by opponents of the teaching of Christian values that they can be divisive. But I note that all core curriculum discussion recognises the importance of our aim. It is the Marxists and


many Socialist supporters—though not all—who oppose this concept.
As regards getting Christian values across to children so that they pick them up for use in their daily lives in "shorthand", what is wrong with the teaching of the Ten Commandments? It is said by opponents such as those I have described that the Ten Commandments are negative and that this would be negative teaching. But so much of life is about what we cannot do. In the end there is not much that we are allowed to do, but we must know what we can and cannot do and what is ethically right or wrong. I know of no better or quicker means of getting across to children the basic difference between right and wrong than the Ten Commandments. I believe that they are vital.
The value of compassion for the underdog and the weak members of society needs to be constantly taught if schools are not be hotbeds of bullying. School assemblies, or the religious education period, can be used for this purpose. Bible stories, such as the story about the Good Samaritan, are excellent illustrations of compassion.
Thomas Arnold, the celebrated headmaster of Rugby school, said:
My aim is to make Christian gentlemen; Christian boys I can scarcely hope to make.
We must remember that education is a continuing process and that boys and girls need to be reminded daily of compassion in terms of living with one another in society, and I am keen that it should happen.
I also believe that the classical virtues need to be taught in schools much more vigorously, both by precept and by practice. The virtues of faith, hope, love, humility, self-control, truthfulness and right judgment should be taught. Who can challenge the value of teaching these great concepts to children at an age when they are receptive and able to practise them in their daily lives for their own well-being and that of their fellow men?
The fruits of the spirit are also great concepts and excellent teaching material for boys and girls, and also adults. The fruits of the spirit are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Is it not valuable for these great ideals to be expoun-

ded in society all the time in a positive and strong way?
We must not forget the seven deadly sins. About a year ago I set a group of children whom I was then teaching a task of putting the concept of each of the seven deadly sins into a sentence. I well remember a small but very fat girl saying that she thought that gluttony was when she took the last piece of cake off the plate when all other members of the family—there were 10 in her family—might want it. In her case she grabbed it first and thought that that was a fair concept of greed. Other children gave very succinct descriptions of their concepts of avarice, lust, and so on.
I remember a remarkable film called "The Seven Deadly Sins" which explained just what those sins are and mean to society. I have remembered the teaching which went with that film and I shall remember it all my life. I am not saying that an understanding of virtues and sin will produce the perfect man. Alas, the good society will always be unattainable. But if we cease to strive towards it and let the schools off the hook our society will be impoverished and there will be violence between man and man, and man and child, such as we have not previously known.
The debate in the House of Lords last week on sex education was of great value. Some peers argued for it to be kept out of the schools altogether and left as a responsibility for the parents. There is much to be said for that view. Other peers, who eventually won the day, believed that the school had a role to play in this process but considered that the parents should be involved. That is crucial. If schools are to teach sex education, it must be done in conjunction with the parents. This subject illustrates and typifies the whole problem of teaching value-laden subjects in today's schools. There is no doubt about that.
Those who wish to exclude sex education from the curriculum claim that the schools often introduce the wrong values. That is provable. Even if it is not possible to argue that these values, whether too liberal or too puritanical, were objectively wrong, at least they were different from those that parents hoped were being taught to their children. This can lead only to confusion at best or the


downright undermining of moral standards at worst, which is serious, whether the undermining is done by the schools or the parents.
Despite the difficulties, the schools cannot just opt out and pretend that the problem is not there. The occasions when ethical questions about sex have to be answered cannot be avoided, whether they occur in the biology laboratory, because of the discovery of a pornographic magazine in the desk, or when pupils are discussing a television play—and we know there are many controversial plays—or following the news of the birth of a brother or sister. The teachers involved must be prepared to express some opinion and to bear witness to some values. The school of which they are a part should help them to identify which values they should be upholding.
Lady Young was right to point out in closing the debate in the other place that the governors of a school had some responsibility in that direction. They certainly have, and I hope that they will exercise it more strongly than many have so far. They have responsibilities with regard to values generally and not just over sexual attitudes and behaviour. Their job is not easy, nor is the teacher's. As the document by Her Majesty's inspectors, "Curriculum 11–16", put it in 1977,
Value systems are changing rapidly and attitudes towards such problems as violence, sexual morality and the boundaries of tolerance are increasingly unclear.…In a world of pluralist values the messages received by schools can be contradictory and confusing. Society does not speak with one voice.
Yet HMIs are quite clear that there are some standards that society can demand of the schools. As they say,
certain general qualities and attitudes—integrity, reliability, application to work, and consideration for others"—
all fundamental to a happy life for any individual and for society—should be established
by example as well as by precept".
I want to open up two further questions. First, what are the values—further to what I have said—that society can legitimately demand should be taught in the schools? Second, precisely how can they be taught, whether by example or precept, and how can the House assist? I have said that I want to open up the

questions. I do not have time to answer them in detail, but I must set out in pursuit of one or two possible answers.
The recently published Department of Education and Science document, "A Framework for the Curriculum", suggests that the schools should have among their aims the following items: to help children develop lively, inquiring minds; to give them the ability to apply themselves to tasks; to instil respect for other people and for oneself; to instil tolerance of other races, religions and ways of life; to help children use language more imaginatively; and to help them properly to esteem the essential role of industry and commerce in maintaining the nation's standard of living. That last object is often undermined by all sorts of attitudes of Left-wing teachers.
Another separate item speaks of instilling respect for moral values, but it is not a separate activity. Even though very few of the words in the items that I have quoted are overtly value words, every item contains a major value judgment at its centre. It is judged to be a good thing that minds should be lively and inquiring, as opposed to being docile and merely receptive. Application and persistence are judged to be good things. So are respect for and tolerance of others—other races, religions, ways of life.
Language is seen as having a creative, imaginative function, not being used merely for basic communication of information and instructions. Industry and commerce are to be properly esteemed, not held up as monstrous polluters of the environment or manifestations of greed at its most unacceptable.
I am not asking you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, to agree or disagree with any of those value judgments. I am simply showing how almost every item in that list of aims is shot through with value questions.
That leads on inevitably to the assertion that every teacher is a teacher of values. That is generally accepted in primary schools. The recent HMI survey of primary education in England notes that
social development and moral learning are so general that they rarely appear as timetable headings, yet they are frequently given attention in the course of the day to day teaching in every classroom".


Here we have come to my second question. How are values taught? What is the role of example? What is the place of precept?
Example obviously plays a crucial role. However misguided the recent Health Council propaganda film may or may not be, it is right in its basic premise that children learn smoking from their parents. Children also learn loving and caring from their parents. The same is true of pupils and teachers. There is an anonymous prose poem that sums this up very well:

"Children Learn What They Live.

If a child lives with criticism
He learns to condemn.
If a child lives with hostility
He learns to fight.
If a child lives with ridicule
He learns to be shy.
If a child lives with shame
He learns to feel guilty.
If a child lives with tolerance
He learns to be patient.
If a child lives with encouragement
He learns confidence.
If a child lives with praise
He learns to appreciate.
If a child lives with fairness
He learns justice.
If a child lives with security
He learns to have faith.
If a child lives with approval
He learns to like himself.
If a child lives with acceptance and friendship
He learns to find love in the world."

However, the truth of that does not mean that there is no place for precept as well as example, to interpret and generalise the first-hand specific experiences that example will have provided. But there is more to precept than telling someone what is right and what is wrong. Schools must never be content simply with telling. There should at least be basic interaction between the mind of the teacher and the minds of the pupils in discussion. The more lively and vivid that discussion is, the better.

There is a need to help the pupil to see for himself what is right and what is wrong, and why. That involves a fairly long process of development in exploring moral issues, moral quandaries, and examining and discussing other people's moral decisions. Moral judgment is indeed something that can be taught by both direct and indirect means. But not all specific moral decisions are made only on the basis of one's moral skill and ex-

pertise; they are made ultimately on the basis of one's moral vision, one's presuppositions about the nature and significance of human life, and indeed of the whole web of existence.

Here we come to the heart of the teaching of values—whether through the medium of poetry, plays, novels, music or the visual arts or through the study of specifically religious material, such as the scriptures, prayers, hymns or any other of the writings of men of vision. This grappling with questions of meaning and significance must underlie all the teaching of values in our schools, the sense of striving that has gone on throughout the ages.

I asked earlier how the House could forward the process, which I am sure most people will agree is vital today. One simple answer is to ensure that there are enough teachers to do the job and that they are given the resources to enable that job to be done properly. On 8 February my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary gave figures indicating that even if every religious education specialist currently employed in our schools were teaching his own specialism in a secondary school, there would be only one RE teacher for every 273 pupils. What a situation!

If, as one suspects, only two-thirds, at the very most, of these specialists are in secondary schools, there will be only one specialist for every 410 pupils. That is an unacceptable ratio. It is not enough simply to be told the total number of specialists in the subject. We need to know precisely how those specialists are deployed. The Department of Education and Science has that information embedded in its recent staffing survey. Is it not time that that information was made available? We could then see how many specialists are teaching the subject, and, if the pupil-teacher ratio is as low as one suspects, we must call on local education authorities to ensure that the number of RE teachers in secondary schools is brought up to an adequate level and that sufficient provision of semi-specialists is made in primary schools.

I am not castigating the Government. The previous Labour Government, in particular, allowed the situation to deteriorate at an alarmingly rapid rate. I was in a school for the past five years and I felt the situation deteriorating. It


became difficult to recruit specialist teachers of RE. If one found such teachers, it was difficult always to place them in the subject that one wanted. Pressure is put on them to teach other subjects. That deterioration has become particularly marked during the past five years.

It is not enough simply to call on the LEAs. One needs to ensure that salary structures in the subject are right and that training and retraining schemes are widely available for those who want to teach this subject. We must also ensure that teachers are released to take the in-service courses available, that books and other resources are provided in the schools and that examination entries in that subject are not discouraged by the schools. Each LEA should make sure that general support is available from a specialist adviser. Only about 40 per cent. of LEAs have a specialist adviser in this discipline. If we seriously want our schools to be adequate upholders of spiritually-based values once again, these are some of the urgent practical steps that we must take.

Many schools put the RE teacher on a much lower salary scale than correspondingly important heads of department. We all know that that can happen. Heads and governors do not always take a stand for this discipline. I hope that they care—as they must—about the wellbeing of our society. If they do, they will offer the top scales in order to encourage teachers to become heads of RE departments and to take a lead in the teaching of values. RE is an interesting and valuable intellectual discipline. Many pupils study RE to GCE O-level, A-level and CSE level. Many of them thoroughly enjoy the subject.

There are other ways of teaching values. Those methods have been undermined recently in subtle and, perhaps, unintentional ways. Team games have been derided by many people who should know better. Emphasis has been taken away from the value of playing in a team. Playing in a team should be jolly and a bit of a joke. However, I have taught teams in one game or another for 22 years—from my first year in a school to my last. Sometimes I have been responsible for two or three teams at a time in a large school. I know the importance of getting members of a

team to understand the value of supporting each other and of playing together fairly and honestly. I know the value of teaching them to avoid dirty tricks.

Those values have a particular appeal to schoolchildren. A great deal is conveyed to pupils by means of team games. Pupils often see football violence on television. They may go to football matches and see the referee's fair decision being questioned. They may see players walking off the field in a temper. There are great abuses of team games by people who should know better.

We should reassert the value of team games in schools. We should wholly support teachers who are prepared to give their time and effort to helping with team games. We should encourage them. We should constantly stress the fact that fair play is valuable on the field, off the field and in all that one does in life. That can be taught by means of team games.

I am not denigrating sports in which the individual competes against the environment. Such sport is also valuable. I am a strong supporter of sports in which the individual competes against the environment, or against himself. A man who is riding against the clock is up against the most tremendous pressure to be decisive and forward-looking and to plan ahead. Each of those points is basic to the quality of sound, good and sensible living.

Being in the saddle for any time is also valuable. Winston Churchill said that being in the saddle was of the utmost value to any human being at any age. He said that no hour spent in the saddle was lost. The individual who rides a horse in open country or in a riding school has to concentrate completely on the animal that he is riding. He must try to achieve a situation in which horse and rider move as one. All other thoughts must he eliminated from the rider's mind. Concentration is induced in the rider and horse, and that is of great value. It is important to have the ability to concentrate one's mind on what is important and to keep it there. Therefore, individual sports also have much to offer.

One could speak similarly about skiing, mountaineering, athletics, and many other sports. I want to encourage strongly the great value of fair play in both team and individual sports. I wish to encourage


give and take, because that is what life is all about.

A sound ethos is vital to the success of any school. There is no substitute, in my view, for the Christian ethos. It may be possible to establish an honest and sound ethos in other ways. However, I could not do that myself. I do not say that it could not be done; I am merely doubtful. I have tried to explain how to achieve an understanding of values in society. I have tried to explain about virtues, deadly sins and so on.

Methods of teaching are a matter for constant research. I have suggested the lines that might be taken. These values should be taught as long as the pupil remains in school. They should be taught every day from the moment that school starts until the moment it ends. High standards of work, behaviour, discipline and attendance will follow upon a respect for high values. Work is essential—whether in the home or elsewhere—and it is basic to the life of every happy person. Discipline and compassion also go together in the life of an integrated pupil. The integrated pupil will attend school and will be keen.

It is impossible to achieve a totally acceptable and happy atmosphere in a school without sanctions. We should have sanctions which pupils accept and understand, and which teachers respect and can enforce. Many local education authorities have got rid of valuable and long-standing sanctions without putting anything in their place. That has done as much to undermine schools as anything else. It is very serious.

May I quote what Piaget said:
Young children learn all their moral judgments from adults and older children".
It is important for the teaching profession to remember its central responsibilities. I have a piece of work written for me a year ago by a pupil of 15, who was not a high-flier. He said this of good teachers:
The qualities of the good teacher are that he/she must be patient. He must not be too strict, but strict enough to keep the pupils under control and must make the lesson interesting for them. If the teacher is too strict the pupils turn against him and they find it difficult to get on with each other. If he is too weak, the situation will be even worse He should be able to make things clear and be fair.

ROYAL ASSENT

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bernard Weatherill): I have to notify the House, in accordance with the Royal Assent Act 1967, that the Queen has signfied Her Royal Assent to the following Acts:

1. Highlands and Islands Air Services (Scotland) Act 1980
2. Education Act 1980
3. Competition Act 1980
4. Cheshire County Council Act 1980

SCHOOLS (TEACHING VALUES)

The Under-Secretary of State for Education and Science (Dr. Rhodes Boyson): The announcement of the Queen signifying Her Royal Assent to the Education Act, which we spent time discussing in the early hours of this morning, is significant, as we are again dealing with education.
My hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, North (Mr. Greenway) and I first met 19 years ago, just after the Easter break, when I came to take my first headship in London. I lived at that time in the Oxford university settlement, a great boxing club in Mape Street, in Bethnal Green. The first person whom I came to know was my hon. Friend, who is again my neighbour in his constituency of Ealing, North, which adjoins Brent, North. My hon. Friend has done a great service to the House and to education and moral values in choosing this subject for debate.
Schools have four main tasks. They must first provide literacy and numeracy, which are like Solomon's wisdom. Once those abilities are achieved, they can be added to.
Secondly, at each stage of history there is a body of knowledge that can be subdivided into subjects and that holds together a common culture, and it is the job of schools to pass it on.
Thirdly, schools should impart the skills to earn a living and enjoy leisure. It is necessary to hold down a job in order to have the money to spend on leisure when the opportunity occurs. I believe that the skills to earn a living should come first, and then the ability to enjoy leisure.
Fourthly, schools should impart values in art, music, religion, philosophy and


literature, which are the great achievements of man that have made civilisation so fine. Culture is civilisation's greatest flower.
In all these tasks values should persist. The hidden value in every school is the way that staff deal with pupils and pupils with staff. If the school is civilised, with staff respecting pupils and the head respecting the staff, the pupils will return that respect.
I pay tribute to British schools. Compared with schools in many other countries, they have almost uniquely fulfilled pastoral care. Not only house masters and year masters but all teachers feel that to teach their class best they need to know the individuals, their homes and the problems and advantages of their family background. That pastoral care has raised the status of the teaching profession in Britain and differs from the lecturing attitude in other countres. It should be treasured by our teachers.
Schools should have an ordered, structured framework within the rule of law. They should cultivate a respect for learning and for other people. My hon. Friend referred to respect for oneself and for others. There must also be respect for learning.
Learning is not rediscovered in every generation. Calculus or language cannot be rediscovered. They have grown up over thousands of years, and must be maintained orally and in writing. Without that, learning collapses.
Children must learn that they are heirs of a great cultural tradition, which must be nurtured. Attacking it will not bring about a better civilisation; it will merely sow dragon's teeth, and anarchy and destruction of law and order will follow.
There must be a respect for the past. The teaching of history is vital. I say that not merely because I am a historian. We should know of the rise and fall of other civilisations and be aware how thin is the veneer of civilisation and how necessary it is to preserve it. An awareness of the achievements and failures of man gives a sense of perspective in values and political judgment.
Schools must teach that there is a price to pay for what one achieves. Nothing is free. To achieve a good essay requires work. People are not born with

the ability to spell a 13-letter or even a four-letter word. It has to he worked at and learnt through, for instance, Schonell spelling books. Only after one has worked over a period and paid the price does one experience the satisfaction of a fine piece of prose or poetry. It does not happen by accident. Achievement requires dedication, work and sacrifice.
We all remember the situation in certain European and American universities in 1968. Teaching values became difficult then, but the situation is settling down. The values of our society and all that we treasured and considered dear were threatened. It is easier to knock down than to build. In the late 1960s and early 1970s in the Western world self-criticism and almost self-flagellation were prevalent. Anything successful had to be destroyed. I almost thought that the slogan would be: "Give us the tools and we will knock down the job." That time has passed, but we must rebuild belief in the family, responsibility of parenthood, and the pride of the teaching profession as one of the greatest professions in history. Teachers have within their hands the training of the young.

Mr. Greenway: I associate myself with my hon. Friend's remarks. The teaching profession is and has long been the greatest profession of all. It has a crucial job to do, of which it is well aware. I am proud to be a member of it.

Dr. Boyson: I welcome my hon. Friend's intervention. We have hundreds of thousands of dedicated teachers, and we should maintain their esteem. We also have orderly and successful schools.
My hon. Friend referred to religious education, which teaches basic values. I do not say that an irreligious person is an immoral person, but the basis of our moral values is the religious sense that we were taught.
We are still a Christian country. The largest group of believers in this country are Christians. When people say that we should no longer have religious education in schools, I tell them that more people go to church on Sunday—not just on Easter Sunday but on any Sunday—than go to football matches on Saturday.
People might say that because football crowds have diminished we need not teach


games in schools. Using the same logic, they say that we should not have religious education in schools. But Christianity is not a dying faith. Churches in my constituency are filled. Every survey shows that the vast majority of parents wish to have religious values taught in schools, even though they may not practise those values themselves. Those parents have respect for the fabric of belief.
It is important to recall the Education Act 1944 in this context. Section 25 (1) provides:
Subject to the provisions of this section, the school day in every county school and in every voluntary school shall begin with collective worship on the part of all pupils.".
That is a clear statement and that provision should be fulfilled. Religious instruction should not be a sociological mish-mash in schools. There should be an act of collective worship in our schools daily, as specified by the Act.
School authorities have a responsibility to fulfil the Act. I said so in Opposition and I say it now in Government. Governors and head teachers should ensure the fulfilment of that provision. I also feel that the Churches should seek to ensure that the Act is fulfilled. Section 25(2) of the Act provides:
Subject to the provisions of this section, religious instruction shall be given in every county school and in every voluntary school.
We call it religious education now. Subject names are always changing, but if one waits for 20 years we usually revert to the original names.
The Act provides for the teaching of religious belief. That does not mean that children must be indoctrinated. I call religious teaching induction. There is a difference between induction and indoctrination. Indoctrination means that no alternative is given—there is coercion. Induction means that one brings a pupil alongside the subject. That means that children can say "Yes" or "No" later.
If young people are not give the chance to realise the strength of religious faith and what it can do, they will be immensely deprived in later life. Children have a right to know the basic religious faith of their parents and of society. I believe that the 1944 Act should be enforced wherever possible and that it should be a priority in every school.
We now have minority groups in our schools. I was head of a school with a 25 per cent. ethnic minority and I was head of another school where the ethnic element was more than 50 per cent. Children from such groups have a right to religious instruction in their faith within our system. Most of our schools are basically Christian, but in the inner cities and areas with large minority groups provision should be made in local schools for the children of such groups to receive religious instruction. Their parents have made it known that that is what they wish. It is not a question of a little of everything and of religion in schools being rather like the Museum of Religion in Moscow, where one learns only about the dates of festivals. Our children should know what living faith means as they grow up.
The teaching of religion in schools is basic to the 1944 Act and our people still desire it, and I believe that the vast majority of our schools still try to fulfil their obligations under the Act.
My hon. Friend referred to the shortage of teachers of religious education. In January there were 100 vacancies for full-time teachers of religious education as a main subject. If we are to fulfil the need of which I have spoken, we shall in the 1980s, need recruitment of 500 teachers of RE every year. My hon. Friend is a member of the Anglican faith and I was godfather, with Bishop Trevor Huddleston, to one of his sons. That shows the wisdom and breadth of approach of my hon. Friend.
I share my hon. Friend's concern about the shortage of teachers of RE. I believe that the solution to that problem is partially in the hands of the Churches. The churches have their voluntary colleges built originally with the pennies of the members of those Churches. They were established to train teachers to teach particular faiths. I think that in those colleges emphasis should be placed on ensuring that they fulfil their original roles, because I am sure that their work will help solve the shortage of teachers of religious subjects.
There is strong feeling on the subject of sex education in our schools. My hon. Friend the Member for Reigate (Mr. Gardiner) proposed a new clause to our new Education Act. It was not called


but was discussed in another place. That new clause dealt with the rights of parents in the matter of sex education.
I recall an article of 14 February by Ronald Butt in The Times. That article generated much correspondence and concern about the teaching of sex education in this country. There is justified concern about sex education being given value-free—where a kind of sex manual is used and where the activity becomes a branch of the Olympics. The concern is felt because sex is taught merely as a physical activity without consideration of ethical and moral values. In that context there appears to be no realisation that sex is part of the totality of man and that self-control should be taught.
All relationships have spiritual and moral implications, and sexual activity can blossom properly only within the constraints exercised by those moral, ethical and value judgments to which I have referred. It is important to remember that.
If my memory serves me well—as it does on most occasions—the article in The Times referred to schools where sex could be taught value-free and where parents objected to that. Sex was seen to be almost like the high jump.
Sex education must take place within a framework of moral and social responsibility. The article referred to a book called "Make it Happy". I have had many letters about that book. I have not seen it, but I intend to read it. People objected to the way sex was dealt with in that book and the way that the book was used in schools.
My hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, North asked what could be done and offered some excellent suggestions on how sex education might be undertaken. Obviously, where questions on sexual matters are raised by pupils they must be answered direct by teachers, just as they would be

answered by parents when such questions arise naturally. The subject must not be kept in a watertight compartment.
However, where sex education is part of a school syllabus—some people do not like that—it is important that the governing body of the school should be aware of the syllabus. That is important in relation to the new Education Act. That Act has enfranchised parent-governors in all schools and enabled parents to express their opinions within the governing body—in the presence of the head and members of staff—about sex education.
Baroness Young, in another place, recalled that section 8 of the Act affords the right of information to parents. Under the Act the Secretary of State can, by regulation, require local education authorities to provide information to parents on such topics as staff qualifications, examination results and the school syllabus to parents. Similarly, it could be used by the Secretary of State to require LEAs to publish information about the various schools' arrangements for sex education. This is a vehicle that could be used.
We cannot escape the fact that parents have a right to know. The children come from the parents and not from the school, and parents have a right to know the type of sex education that is given when they are choosing a school.
We are now approaching the end of this debate. I am grateful to my hon. Friend for bringing the matter to the attention of the House. Education is not just a question of literacy and numeracy; it is a question of values. Civilisation and wisdom are more than knowledge. This debate has given me the opportunity to pay tribute to the work that is done in many schools throughout the country in the teaching of values as well as knowledge, and we hope that this will spread. As a Government, we support the great work being done in our schools.

CAMBODIA

Mr. Stan Thorne (Preston, South): I begin by thanking Mr. Speaker, or whoever was responsible, for giving me the opportunity to raise this subject today. I do not suppose that the selection of Adjournment debates was expected to have some continuity, but, having listened to the previous debate about moral judgment, I begin by saying that the moral judgment underpinning my contribution is that we are our brothers' keepers.
It is not my intention to analyse in any depth the events which have produced the present famine in Kampuchea, although the politics of the situation cannot be divorced from the threat. This forms a background for the present situation. The Pol Pot regime made a major contribution to the present difficulties. Much can be said about the lunatic aspirations of Pol Pot which clearly had nothing to do with either Socialism or Communism. In May 1975 he said:
Of the 8 million people in Kampuchea we need only 1 million loyal to the marrow of their bones.
That is a recipe for mass extermination, and that was his business.
I shall not recapitulate the events in Kampuchea. Instead I shall highlight the problem which has followed in the wake of the policies of Pol Pot which he claims are to be found in the works of Mao Tse-tung. The declaration of the United Front for National Salvation of Kampuchea states:
Our people will build a peaceful, independent, democratic, neutral non-aligned Kampuchea which will advance towards socialism.
Be that as it may, I believe that Kampuchea has a right to self-determination. It is not our job to interfere in the political internal affairs of that country. But at the same time we cannot, in all humanity, stand aside from the present problem. That is the main thrust of my argument today.
One needs only to turn to the reports from eyewitnesses who have visited Kampuchea. These reports have appeared in the Far Eastern Economic Review, The Guardian, the Financial Times and The Times. All the reports had one thing in common—they stressed the effect of famine in Kampuchea.
The scanty harvest of 1979 has exhausted food in the Battambang province and the population of nearly 1 million have no more than one meal of rice a month available to them. Government officials, teachers and Government employees seem to take priority over everyone else in the allocation of food. Wages consist of rice at levels which mean starvation in real terms. An official of the Battambang province recently said that the province had no food left and that its people were totally dependent on international aid. Unhappily, that does not apply only to the one province. The survival of the vast majority of Kampucheans, who are not Government employees, hangs on the programmes implemented by UNICEF, the International Red Cross and other international organisations.
The people of Kampuchea have experienced genocide and war and now they are faced with mass starvation. Signs of malnutrition and disease are evident wherever one travels in that unhappy country. Thousands of sickly children, many without parents, have bloated bellies and brown hair—the symptoms of malnutrition. Every provincial hospital is filled with patients who are suffering from the effects of severe malnutrition. About 60 per cent. of patients at the grim, unlit hospital at Pursat are suffering from anaemia and debility. At Kompong, in the Chnang hospital, 140 of the 164 emaciated patients are there because they have not had enough to eat. Neither hospital, supposedly catering for an entire province, has a doctor.
Malnutrition makes people too weak to work and particularly vulnerable to disease. That is a vicious circle. The United Nations food experts have said that between now and December this year the country will need at least a quarter of a million tons of food to prevent mass starvation, and 40,000 tons of seed planting this month. Also, fertilisers and agricultural equipment are vital necessities. Whether the food arrives depends largely on the response of donor countries.
There is justified concern about the right sort of distribution of aid within Kampuchea, and, in my view, the United Nations must find a way of ensuring that the needy are fed because the problem will be exacerbated by a poor spring harvest.
In response to this, Oxfam has recently decided on a £6·5 million input into Kampuchea. It plans to allocate it between seed and agricultural equipment. I understand that there are prospects of establishing floating docks to alleviate the problem of the Mekong river, where there is a bottleneck of unloaded ships. Also, Oxfam has not ruled out the possibility of an airlift. This is valuable aid, but the immediate problem of food remains, and with it comes the problem of distribution.
Unfortunately, charges have been made about the Vietnamese army and its diversion of international aid. I am happy to report that a recent visitor, Mr. Paul McCleary, the executive director of Church World Service, has said that he is well satisfied that neither the Kampuchean Government in Phnom Penh nor the Vietnamese were impeding the distribution of food or aid to the people. Food is reaching the remotest provinces, but much more will need to be done between now and the end of the year in order to avert a catastrophe.
Wherever one turns for evidence, one comes back to this serious assessment. The executive director of UNICEF has sent a message to its national committees in the aid-giving countries saying that the dry season crop, harvested in April and May, may be an almost total failure in many provinces. It is in the summer therefore, that death through starvation could be a major factor in Kampuchea.
The UNICEF programme director, recently in London, made reference to certain inputs in terms of vehicles. The Soviet Union has apparently supplied 600 vehicles, including 225 trucks. UNICEF and the Red Cross have given 275 trucks. As a result, food distribution has been cased. It is, however, a measure of the problem that a further 500 trucks will be needed over the next few months if distribution is to be speeded and the relief area widened. The systematic destruction of bridges was a factor of the Vietnamese advance of 1979. The Khmer Rouge wished to hamper that advance at all costs. The destruction of bridges, the digging of ditches and all sorts of ways and means were used to destroy the highways. There has been little in terms of restoration of those highways.
Movement by road is a major factor. I understand that there is a speed limit of 20 kilometres an hour, together with the possibility of guerrilla activity, especially after sunset.
I wish to refer to a relevant report by Nayan Chanda following a recent visit. He speaks of hundreds of people seen on the roads leading to the Thai border, travelling on bicycles and bullock carts and returning with rice and soya beans distributed by international agencies along the border. Some families, however, are so helpless, through failing health due to shortage of food, that they are unable to pedal a long way or to secure a bullock cart.
During the last few days The Guardian has done a service by printing articles by Martin Woollacott giving direct eye-witness reports from Phnom Penh and various parts of Kampuchea. I am sure that the Minister and officials of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office have seen the article that appeared on Tuesday in which reference was made to the problems of children in Kampuchea. It is virtually impossible when reading these reports to perceive of any action that the nations of the world can take to obliterate the damage already done to children—damage of a psychological character, among other things.
Our responsibility, against that background, is to see that the children at least get the opportunity to grow and develop in spite of their experiences, which have been commonplace, in terms of death, killings, tortures and deprivation, the like of which we in the United Kingdom cannot visualise. The relief effort was reported in the Financial Times on 28 March to be in disarray. One of the reasons advanced was the difficulty in running the programme through the United Nations since the Pol Pot regime is said to be still recognised by the General Assembly of the United Nations as the legal Government. I hope that the Minister, in his reply, will clarify the position. I understand that the report is not quite accurate. If it is accurate, I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will be able to indicate that we would be seeking to take an initiative to change that situation.
I am anxious to give the Minister adequate time to reply to the main points I


have raised. West Germany, Switzerland, Australia, Sweden and the Netherlands are all reported to have made aid available in varying sums. But the message that emerges from the most recent reports of the situation in Kampuchea is one of considerable disquiet in terms of starvation and risks of large-scale death through malnutrition. It is to this problem that all nations, irrespective of their political analysis of recent events in Vietnam and Kampuchea, must address their energies. To direct attention to and to emphasise the urgency of the matter is the purpose of my speech.
I understand that £7 million was allocated by Her Majesty's Government for aid to Kampuchea some time ago. Estimates have now been made that suggest that £2¾ million has reached Kampuchea and that £2 million has gone to refugees in Thailand. There would appear to be an anomaly in those reports if they are accurate.
I hope that it will be possible for the Minister to clarify the situation and certain other points that I have raised against a background of a firm resolve that, in spite of all the difficulties, it is the Government's intention to try to alleviate as soon as possible the very grave crisis in Kampuchea.

The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. Peter Blaker): I am grateful for the opportunity provided by the hon. Member for Preston, South (Mr. Thorne) to discuss again the human tragedy of Cambodia. This tragedy has been one of the most heartrending of recent decades. We have seen a country that is essentialy peaceful involved, against its will, in a war orginating in a neighbouring State. We have seen it taken over, by force, by a group of people who certainly describe themselves as Marxists, whose bloodthirsty fanaticism has exceeded anything known elsewhere, subjected by these fanatics to the brutal killing of hundreds of thousands of its own people, including a high proportion of the better educated and the potential leaders, and then, 15 months ago, on Christmas Day 1978, exactly a year before the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, invaded and largely conquered by a Marxist neighbour of whom the Cambodians have long lived in fear.
This is an appropriate time to consider again the problem of famine in Cambodia. The first phase of the relief operation, mounted by a number of international agencies, for which the appeal of the United Nations Secretary-General last October raised over £100 million, came to an end on 31 March. We and other Governments are now considering our response to further appeals to enable the emergency relief operation, both inside and outside Cambodia, to continue through the monsoon to the end of 1980.
As it is almost exactly three months since the House last considered this question, I shall give the House the Government's assessment of how far the situation has changed. I shall first deal with one of the points raised by the hon. Gentleman towards the end of his speech, namely, whether the fact that the Pol Pot regime is recognised, as he called it, by the United Nations affects the provision of aid.
The situation is that the Khmer Rouge, as they now call themselves are accepted by the United Nations, by a majority vote at the last General Assembly, as the representatives of Cambodia. This is a different matter from the provision of aid and the provision of relief. What has tended to hold up a more satisfactory provision and distribution of aid has been partly the inadequacy of the infrastructure in Cambodia which was largely destroyed during the time of Pol Pot but also the reluctance of the Heng Samrin regime to accept more people from the international relief agencies.
For example, a number of countries have made offers of medical teams who are prepared to go into Cambodia, but the regime has accepted only three such teams, all from Eastern Europe. The situation has improved somewhat. The international agencies have been able to get more people into Cambodia, but not nearly as many as they would like. I hope that they will continue their efforts to persuade the regime to accept more.
In the first phase of the relief programme, the agencies working in Cambodia among displaced and refugee Cambodians in the Thai border area and in camps and holding centres in Thailand have delivered 70,000 tonnes of foodstuffs, several hundred vehicles, cranes, fork lift trucks, barges, tugs, about 50,000 gallons of fuel, nearly 50 tonnes of drugs,


dietary supplements, medical and other supplies. As the House knows, the contribution of the Government in the first phase has been over £7 million.
The agencies have between them spent most of the £100 million to which I referred and have done their utmost to ensure, even in the chaotic economic, political, and security environment in which much of their work has had to be done, that it has been well spent, honestly spent and duly accounted for.
The agencies have gone to a great deal of trouble in providing information on the programme to date, though there remain gaps in the recording of what has been done, arising not from their unwillingness to provide information but because of the limits of their own ability to monitor what is going on inside the country.
I hope that the House will agree with me when I say that there are occasions when it is more important to get things done than to ensure that they are written down in detail for the record.
I also hope that the House, and indeed the entire international community, will join me in extending our gratitude to the agencies that have taken on this task—to the International Committee of the Red Cross and to UNICEF, as well as to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the World Food Programme and the Food and Agriculture Organisation. In particular, I pay tribute to the Secretary-General's foresight in appointing Sir Robert Jackson to his role as special representative to co-ordinate the programme.
I am sure that the House will also want me to record its thanks and gratitude to the British voluntary agencies that have sent famine relief into Cambodia and to camps in Thailand and medical teams to the latter. A tribute is also due to the British people in general for their remarkable response to the appeals made towards the end of last year. According to my information, there is scarcely a single agency involved in humanitarian work overseas that has not made its contribution.
There is a difficulty about getting information about the exact situation inside Cambodia. A number of journalists have recently visited the country and we are getting a little more information, but,

of course, journalists are not able to cover the whole country. It is clear that at the beginning of the second phase of the international relief operation we can record some success, but a lot more remains to be done.
The hon. Member asked whether food was going to civil servants, as opposed to the population for whom it was intended. Once again, we have inadequate information. It is probable that those in control in Phnom Penh have fed their own supporters—whether soldiers, Government employees or others—and those in the immediate vicinity of the city in preference to those who needed supplies in remote areas.
I believe that the agencies are doing what they can to improve the pattern of distribution and that they will continue to do so. In a recent report they have said that there is general agreement among international representatives in Cambodia that the great bulk of relief supplies has gone to those civilians most in need of help.
Our judgment is that the international effort over the past six months has succeeded, in conjunction with the harvest of two limited rice crops, in reversing the picture of widespread starvation, disease and death that drew the international response of last autumn.
Nevertheless, if I were to sum up the prospects now, I could do no better than report and endorse the assessment of a senior United Nations officer that at the beginning of April the danger the people of Cambodia face is that of widespread and severe malnutrition in the rest of 1980.
A critical element in the plans of the relief agencies for the next stage is an attempt to ensure that the next major harvest takes Cambodia a long way towards agricultural self-sufficiency, by providing about 30,000 tonnes of seed rice and associated agricultural support equipment to be used in the major rice-growing provinces. Cambodia ought to be at least self-sufficient in food. It used to be a food exporter, and that is the position to which the world must aim to restore the country.
In the meantime, there is a need to provide considerable quantities of foodstuffs and to ensure that they are widely distributed around Cambodia before the rains make road movement difficult.
The latest request from the agencies for further support has been a request for $120 million—about £50 million—of which about $40 million has been pledged, to cover their expenses for the next three months or so, beyond which they naturally find it difficult to foresee their needs.
I am not at this stage in a position to give details of the contribution which the Government will be making, particularly since we have to keep in mind the existence of other distressing humanitarian problems, for example, in Somalia and in other parts of Africa. But we will naturally be responding to the request from the agencies both directly and through a joint contribution from the European Community.
Comment in the press and elsewhere tends to concentrate on the relief programme inside Cambodia, but we should not forget the work that is being done in Thailand and along the Thai border, where more than ¼ million Cambodians are being cared for by the Thai and international authorities.
In January I was able to visit two camps in Thailand where Cambodian refugees were being cared for. I was impressed by the progress that had been made. One of the camps, containing 112,000 refugees from Cambodia, was under the supervision of a young British man who is a former member of the staff of one of our well-known weekly magazines.
According to the information that I was given, the improvement in the conditions of refugees in the two or three months preceding my visit had been remarkable. Certainly it appeared that, with few exceptions, and certainly among the children, the problem of starvation had been overcome. The death rate had dropped dramatically.
No praise can be high enough for those who have looked after the refugees in those camps in Thailand. A great tribute is also due to the, Government of Thailand for the action that they have taken.
It is important to remember that much food has gone into Cambodia over the "ox-cart" bridge, carried by ox-cart or on bicycles deep into Cambodia. Behind the massive humanitarian effort, the political problem has, regrettably, moved no closer to a solution. Without such a solution, there must always be a danger that famine will recur.
The Vietnamese army, which outnumbers its various opponents by 6 or 7 to 1, has not made any major advances during the dry season so far. The prospects are that the widespread guerrilla activity will continue for at least a year more. That must have implications for the feeding and living standards of the people of Cambodia.
If there were one thing that could lead to a major improvement in the humanitarian plight of the Cambodian people, it would be an end to fighting and the withdrawal of the Vietnamese occupying army, leaving the Cambodian people with appropriate assurances free to choose a Government of their own which could live in peace with all its neighbours, and concentrate its entire efforts on restoring—with the disinterested help of the international community—the health and prosperity of the shattered country.
When my right hon. Friend the Lord Privy Seal spoke in the House on 6 December, he pledged the Government's support for efforts leading to a Government of Cambodia freely chosen by the Khmer people themselves. That remains the essential priority.
We and our colleagues in the European Community have recently taken a step further our close links with the five member States of ASEAN which rightly see their stability and prosperity threatened by the Vietnamese occupation of Cambodia—in which, incidentally, they see a close parallel with the Soviet invasion of Afganistan.
At the beginning of March my right hon. and noble Friend the Foreign Secretary was present in Kuala Lumpur for the signing of the EC-ASEAN co-operation agreement, and the 14 countries present joined in a statement linking the problems of Afghanistan and Cambodia and calling for Soviet and Vietnamese withdrawal from these countries. They emphasised that a solution in Cambodia should be sought through a neutral and independent status for that country. With out peace and stability, and above all without the withdrawal of Vietnamese occupying forces, it is difficult to be confident of a better future for the Cambodian people.
Indeed, there must even be a question whether the Khmer nation can survive. That is why, quite apart from the need


to relieve famine, one of the first priorities of British policy in South-East Asia will be to work with our friends to ensure that the Cambodian people are once again able freely to decide their own destiny.

INTERNATIONAL SPORTS COMPANY LIMITED, MERSEYSIDE

Mr. David Alton (Liverpool, Edge Hill): I am glad to have the opportunity to present the point of view of those in Merseyside who are concerned about the increasing problems of unemployment. I am especially pleased to see you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, in the Chair, as you have the same concern and know about the problems.
I wrote to the hon. Member for Liverpool, Garston (Mr. Thornton) and told him that I would be prepared to share with him the debate on the problems of the closure of the golf ball factory. I have not received a reply. If he arrives, I shall be prepared to give him some of my time.
The loss of 230 jobs at Speke last week was part of a wider loss of jobs in the Dunlop factories in Liverpool. The managing director wrote to me last Friday and told me that the jobs were to be lost. He knew that 2,400 jobs had been lost in Speke at the Dunlop tyre factory only a year earlier.
I spoke as recently as this morning to the managing director, Mr. Findlay Picken. He confirmed that the previous Labour Administration had discussed a package, including a rent-free factory. In total, the package was worth £2·6 million. That would have matched the needs of the company. Regrettably, the constraints and the policies of the present Administration resulted in that global sum being reduced to £975,000. In addition, there would be a 22 per cent. regional development grant, which would have covered such items as new plant and equipment, and a temporary employment subsidy which would have been worth about £20 per week for 26 weeks per employee.

Mr. Anthony Steen: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that while the Government have indicated that they are unable to dole out money from the taxpayers which they do not have, the real problem is that companies must be prepared to invest their own funds in Merseyside? That is what this company seems unwilling to do, largely because of the appalling track record of the work force in the Dunlop plant, which resulted in the company suffering severe losses over a long period.
Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the company should not abandon hope for Merseyside by looking elsewhere or closing down the factory but should consider that Liverpool will be one of the first enterprise zones in the country? For that reason, it may be that all its needs could be met by placing a new factory in the enterprise zone. While I am on my feet—

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Richard Crawshaw): The hon. Gentleman is intervening. He should not make a speech. He has said sufficient for the present.

Mr. Alton: Mr. Keith Ely, the Liverpool Daily Post business editor, said on Friday 11 January:
the workforce—136 of them women—have raised productivity by 13 per cent. and agreed to new manning levels since the tyre plant closed last April.
Productivity was on the increase. The pre-tax profits for Dunlop at the end of last year were £43 million. It can hardly be said to be a firm which is in severe financial difficulties. The only jobs created by free enterprise zones and urban development corporations are those of the chairman and vice-chairman of the new urban development corporation. About 90,000 people are out of work in Liverpool. It is ridiculous to talk in such terms and to ignore the fundamental problems.
The managing director to whom I spoke this morning said that he did not believe that the money offered by the Government was enough to enable the company to go on trading there. His associate, Mr. Allan Stewart at Dunlop House, confirmed that, following the closure of the tyre factory, a joint working party comprising the management and unions was set up to examine alternative products and new ways of creating jobs. He said that it met once a month for six months but that nothing was achieved and that no jobs were created.
It is important to regard the closure in the wider context of Merseyside's growing unemployment problem. The closure of the Dunlop golf ball factory is only the latest in a string of factory closures in the last 10 years. In the last decade the number of people employed in the Merseyside special development area, which was designated in 1972,

has fallen by 123,000. The present total of employees is about 667,000. About 143 firms each made more than 100 people redundant in that time. Last year, a total of 8,804 jobs were lost to Merseyside. In the previous year 9,935 jobs were lost.
Following the closure of the Meccano factory at Christmas we had a similar debate. Merseyside lost a further 2,603 jobs in the first three months of the year. A total of 700 of those jobs were at the Merseyside Docks and Harbour Company, 550 at Massey-Ferguson, 50 at Ulapalm, 400 at Tillotsons, 670 at Hygena and now 233 at Dunlop's golf ball factory.
It is as if there were a death wish on Liverpool. Liverpool is suffering more than other parts of the country from the Government's vicious policies. The unemployment-vacancy ratio on Merseyside is 36 unemployed persons to each vacancy. Nationally, the average is eight unemployed persons to each vacancy.
On Merseyside, the unemployment rate is 12 per cent.—twice the national average. More people on Merseyside are out of work than in the whole of Northern Ireland. Statistically, it is harder to get a job in Liverpool than it is in Scotland or Wales. Yet on April Fool's day the Government announced a £48 million package spread over two years for the development of 200 factories in Wales. I do not begrudge the Welsh that help, but I wonder why all that Liverpool got was a mixture of enterprise zones and urban development corporations.
The Government's whole economic strategy is based upon a 2 per cent. reduction in output which forecasters say will lead to 2 million unemployed by the end of the year. Inevitably, Liverpool will he at the sharp end of that policy.
Losing a job means losing self-respect, independence, dignity and security. The Prime Minister and her colleagues have shown a callous contempt for the fate of Liverpool people. Her Government's policies are failing miserably.
What happened yesterday in Bristol could happen tomorrow in Liverpool. The same bitterness exists among the young people and ethnic groups. It all stems from unemployment. Can we blame the 3,000 Merseyside school leavers who are


still out of work for feeling bitter? Can we blame the 5,000 young people who are out of work for feeling the same?
The Prime Minister is so out of touch with ordinary people and life in our cities that she seriously believes than one can leave nearly 90,000 Merseysiders out of work and not expect riots, disturbances, alienation and bitterness. If she honestly believes that, she is even more insensitive than most people think.
The challenge to the Government, as I see it, is that they must set about developing a long-term strategy for conquering unemployment. First, more help must be given to small businesses. At present, there are 25,000 registered firms on Merseyside. If every firm took on three or four people, our problems would be solved virtually overnight. But how on earth can small businesses flourish or develop whilst they are crippled by a 17 per cent. minimum lending rate and inflation running at 14 per cent?

Mr. Steen: What about the rates going up?

Mr. Alton: How can they survive when they have to cope with a 50 per cent. rate increase, as the hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Mr. Steen) points out, imposed on them by the Labour Administration in the city of Liverpool? I earnestly implore Conservative Members to ensure that the rate support grant is increased so that Liverpool does not have to cut services or create more unemployment in its own services by creating redundancies in the local authority, which would be the effect if the rates were not to be increased by at least 42 per cent.
I think that in the long term the Government must also look at things like work sharing and profit sharing. I am sure that that is the only way to remove the concept of victors and vanquished from our system of industrial relations.
We need to put more incentives into people's lives. We cannot expect workers to work harder if they are not given proper rewards. That is why I believe in the three Rs: rights, representation and reward. We should also have profit-sharing schemes on the West German model and tax cuts as well for people at their places of work. People should be given incentives to work harder. Yet

all that we have had from the Government so far, despite their manifesto promises, has been £3½ billion in tax cuts given away last year, nearly half of which went to only 5·5 per cent. of the people.
The Government are obsessed with a crude belief in monetarism, and it grips half the Cabinet. I believe that they must now rethink that strategy and what they are doing in increasing unemployment and the dole queues. What are we achieving by making more and more people unemployed? What problems are we solving by paying out more money in social security and unemployment benefits? That policy has no tangible long-term effect on communities in cities such as the one that hon. Members like myself and the hon. Member for Waver-tree represent.
There must also be an acceptance that Merseyside workers are as good as workers anywhere else. In The Guardian on 26 February there was a story about factory workers who gave up half their wages to help pay the plant's £900 electricity bill. That was at the Ulapalm children's clothing factory at Knowsley. Those people had a certain sense of bitterness when, a few days later, they were told that they were still to be sacked. Nevertheless, where workers show concern and where management behaves not in an off-handed way by sacking an entire work force—such as at Meccano, where, on half-an-hour's notice, 900 employees, some of whom had worked for 40 years for the firm, were sacked—but treats its work force properly and gives it a share and a stake in the firm, I am sure that we can get the proper response from the work force. There has to be a realisation that long-term unemployment is not acceptable and that it can only undermine order in our society.
I make two points for the short term. I renew my plea that there should be a Minister for Merseyside. I am sure that one of the reasons why Wales and Scotland do better than Merseyside in terms of regional aid and help is that they have Ministers who are prepared to fight for them. Merseyside is a neglected and forgotten area. We should have a Minister to tie together all the different agencies—the urban development corporation, the free enterprise zone, the county council


and the city council—all of which sometimes seem to be doing conflicting jobs.
Secondly, Sir Campbell Fraser, in an interview he gave to Robert Heller, the editor of Management Today, said:
I expect 1979 to go down in Dunlop's history as the year of the salesman.
Sir Campbell Fraser, the chairman of Dunlop, when asked by Mr. Heller whether he thought that people on Merseyside reacted to the Speke closure as though it was directed specifically against them and, further, whether they felt that there was any justice in that view, replied:
Dunlop still have four factories in Liverpool, quite apart from the substantial plants elsewhere in Merseyside, so I think that it would be ridiculous to say that the closure of the Dunlop Speke factory was directed against Merseyside people. But it is a fact that a number of companies have closed factories in the Liverpool area and that should be a matter of concern to us all.
I hope that it will be a matter of concern to the Minister. There are still 1,300 Dunlop jobs on Merseyside. I am of the belief that the Minister should meet Sir Campbell Fraser at an early date and discuss the future of those jobs. I hope that he will come forward with a package of proposals which will give some hope and optimism to the people of Merseyside for the future.
I thank you again, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for enabling this Adjournment debate to take place.

The Under-Secretary of State for Industry (Mr. David Mitchell): The hon. Member for Liverpool, Edge Hill (Mr. Alton) was lucky to have caught your eye Mr. Deputy Speaker, for a debate on the problems of unemployment on Merseyside. I welcome the opportunity to discuss them, because I share with him a concern about the subject. I share, as does my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Mr. Steen), the hon. Member's deep concern about the problems of long-term unemployment.
As the hon. Member said, unemployment is something that challenges one's self-respect. It is one of the most human of problems. It is a problem of special importance to older people who have a real fear that they may not be able to find work again.
We all know the syndrome of "too old at 40". I think that much of British industry is now coming to realise that that is a very foolish policy on industry's part, because an older person will often give more stable service than a younger person. Nevertheless, there is a genuine fear, and it causes great concern to my colleagues and myself.
Mention has already been made of the very serious problem of young people who are unemployed—the problem that arises because of the danger that they will come to accept a pattern of life in which regular work is not a part and then face all the dangers, risks and problems of relearning a pattern of regular work, which for those who left school to become unemployed is an immensely serious matter. Therefore, we are deeply concerned about unemployment.
The hon. Member referred to the particular question of the International Sports Company factory, which is in the Garston constituency, not his own. He said that my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Garston (Mr. Thornton) might have some views on the subject. I should like to return to that matter. However, I should like to use the few minutes that I have, first, to pose a question that cannot be ignored. I pose it as a principle rather than specifically. Secondly, I should like to consider the very important points that have been made about unemployment on Merseyside in general. Thirdly, I want to deal with the specific question of the factory that has been mentioned.
Perhaps the hon. Member will consider this problem. Let us suppose that there are two widget factories and that demand for widgets is static. Let us suppose that the imports of widgets are rising; and suppose that by rationalising the two factories, with all the production in one factory, widgets could be produced less expensively and more economically than in two factories, and by so doing it was possible to beat off the challenge of rising imports and to supply and satisfy a home market at a price that it was prepared to pay; and suppose that one were able to export the commodity. Would it actually be a kindness, and a proper use of public money in that circumstance, to say to the owners of the two factories "No, you should not do that, even though economically it would help you


to keep your share of the market. What you should do is to run two factories, both of them at less than full capacity and both of them, therefore, producing at higher cost than would be possible if you concentrated production in one factory"?
As a result of not rationalising the two factories, part of the market share would be lost, there would be a bigger increase in imports from abroad, and eventually the skids would go under both factories because neither was able to compete when it was not producing at a fully economic rate.
That is the question that lies behind what has been said in the debate. It must be considered whether it is justifiable to use public money to set in train circumstances that will put at risk the jobs of men in two different factories.
I turn to the more specific problems of unemployment on Merseyside and the factory concerned. There is a widespread understanding in all parts of the House of the tragedy of unemployment. It is not new to Merseyside. Successive Governments have recognised that. I, as a new Minister in the Department of Industry, look back at the problem and see the tragedy. We have had a policy dealing with assisted and depressed areas—as they were then called—since the 1920s and 1930s, particularly the early 1930s. That policy was designed to try to deal with the problem of structural weakness. The principal areas that were affected suffered not because of anything that they had done wrong but because of progress at the end of the last century. Their industrial structure was built up for products that are now being phased out. Inevitably, that posed problems of structural change and additional costs.
The hon. Member for Edge Hill said that he felt that the Government should rethink their strategy. He is right to point to the need for a new strategy. The Government have a new strategy. We have examined what has been happening. Through the years we have been spreading thinly aid to the assisted areas, to the point at which last summer we found that over 40 per cent. of the working population in the country had assisted area status. When the jam is spread so thinly, not much of it is concentrated anywhere.
The Government should take on board the points about rethinking strategy. We should reduce the proportion of assisted areas to 25 per cent. of the working population so that we can start to concentrate on those areas. We should do so for two reasons. In the special development areas the full 22 per cent. of regional development grant is available and, in addition section 7 assistance is available. It would also make the relatively small area across the totality of the country—25 per cent. only—stand out, so that there would be a smaller area to which companies wishing to move were attracted. That is a right and proper response to the point—on which I agree with the hon. Member for Edge Hill—that the policies that we tried in the past were not as successful as we had reason to expect.

Mr. Steen: I should like to ask three questions. First, I am sure that my hon. Friend agrees that there is no point in establishing an enterprise zone on Merseyside if the city council pursues a programme that is detrimental to the small firm. The planning controllers on Merseyside are so different and slow that small firms are being driven out. Secondly, if the commercial rates rise by 50 per cent., many more small firms will be driven out of business. Thirdly, local authorities are continuing to destroy and demolish small firms and rebuild public housing on the sites. If that continues, there is no point in an enterprise zone, because many of the firms will be pushed out, despite the new enthusiasm towards the enterprise zone on the docks.

Mr. Mitchell: There is irresistible logic in what my hon. Friend says, in that, while the Government are considering where they will locate enterprise zones, we obviously want to put the substantial amount of resources that will be used into places where the local authorities will create the circumstances in which they will succeed. I cannot quarrel with that view.
If the level of rates in Liverpool is to increase by the amount suggested by my hon. Friend, I can only join with him in expressing deep concern about the effect that that will have on employment in Liverpool, particularly with regard to


small firms. In my own constituency, the Basingstoke borough council has this year not increased its rate by a brass farthing, but it has had to make enormous economies in order to achieve that. In so doing, it keeps itself as an attractive place to which industry can come. However, I must not be drawn aside from the important questions that I want to cover.
The economy of Merseyside has been, and still is, closely related to the port of Liverpool, and many of Merseyside's problems derive from the contraction of the port and related activities, resulting from modernisation, changes in shipping patterns and the world recession in shipbuilding. The whole of the South Docks on the Liverpool bank of the Mersey and much of Birkenhead docks are now derelict, as I saw for myself when I looked around the area.
To compensate to some extent, there has been new industrial growth, largely on the periphery and in the new towns, and there are now important national concentrations on Merseyside of the motor vehicle, food processing, general engineering and petrochemical industries.
The Liverpool travel-to-work area has been hard hit by redundancies in recent years, and for most of the decade unemployment in the Merseyside SDA has been double the national average. However, there have been some notable successes recently, such as GEC-Fairchild Limited, which is setting up its new microprocessor plant at Norton, with the creation of over 1,000 jobs in the early 1980s; CEC-Schreiber Limited, which is equipping a new factory at Runcorn to manufacture furniture, creating up to 1,000 jobs by March 1982; the Cooperative Bank, which is setting up at Skelmersdale. Six hundred jobs are expected by 1982, and the Ford United Kingdom Company is investing about £600 million in production of a new model. Therefore, there are some hopeful signs. I announced yesterday a new scheme of training to industry in areas such as Merseyside for in-plant training, which I am sure will be a major attraction.
Liverpool was designated as a partnership area under the Inner Urban Areas Act 1978. I can announce today that it

has been allocated about £17 million, at 1980–81 outturn prices, for the year 1980–81 for projects to improve the area.
Mention has been made of small firms. I believe that they are immensely important. I should like to have been able to go on and talk about how important I believe it to be to create the, circumstances in which they can succeed. However, I want to say a word about the Dunlop golf ball plant in Liverpool, because that presents a real problem. That plant is located within the Dunlop Speke tyre factory and has been wholly reliant upon the tyre factory for steam, water, power and some engineering services. It is not viable for it to continue on its own once the tyre factory closes, because all the overheads of a large factory cannot possibly be borne by the smaller unit on its own.
The factory is in the constituency of my lion. Friend the Member for Garston, who has been most active in dealing with the problem. He has had a series of meetings with the trade unions, the management and the Department, including a visit to my noble Friend the Minister of State. He has also discussed the problem with me. He is currently involved in sensitive negotiations, in full consultation with the trade unions involved, and in arrangement with it he has sought and secured an Adjournment debate specifically on the subject of a factory in his own constituency on Friday 18 April.
As sensitive negotiations are at present in progress, it might be more appropriate to have a further discussion at the time of that Adjournment debate with my hon. Friend the Member for Garston, whose constituency is involved.
I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Wavertree about the need to encourage industry into the area. This is a central part of what the Government are seeking to do. In this case there is no problem of bad industrial relations; indeed, it belies the unfair reputation that so often attaches itself to parts of Merseyside. Of course we admit that there are bad industrial relations, but there is also much good. It is a great pity that the whole of Merseyside is maligned because of what might have happened in one or two cases. Indeed, the factory where I have seen the greatest degree of


hard work in this country since I have been a Minister is in Birkenhead, on Merseyside, and I pay tribute to it.
I do not want to prejudge what might be raised by my hon. Friend in the debate on Friday 18 April, but if the company were to conclude that even with Government aid a factory would not be viable we would be wasting public money if we were to twist its arm and seek to persuade it to set up a project that it knew would not make economic sense. I doubt whether it would be a kindness to the workers involved to lavish immense amounts of public money on creating a factory that could not pay, for the reasons that I have spelt out. That would mean that shortly after commencing work the men would lose their jobs. At the same time, it would endanger the prosperity of the second factory at Normanton, which has a real prospect of producing economically. If it receives the extra throughput that is available to it at present, that company has a real prospect of securing a large part of the United Kingdom market and successfully holding off competition from abroad.
I hope that the hon. Member for Edge Hill will understand that as my hon. Friend has been so actively involved in this matter it would be wise to leave the question of industrial relations for him to deal with. However, I am grateful to the hon. Member for raising the problems of unemployment on Merseyside as a whole. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Wavertree, I am deeply concerned about them, as are the Government.

RATES (GOVERNMENT CONTRIBUTION)

Mr. James Hill (Southampton, Test): It is a pleasure for me to put forward what I would term two direct ways of raising taxation, both of which are unpleasant in their sheer nature. First, I refer to the Layfield report and the discussions on the possible abolition of domestic rates. Layfield reviewed, amongst other things, the present rating system and the committee received evidence from those who favoured the wholesale abolition of rates, some reforms within the existing system or radical reform.
The response of the Labour Government to the Layfield report was a Green Paper, published in May 1977. There was basic agreement with Layfield which said that the advantages of the present rating system outweighed the disadvantages and that the system should be retained in the absence of a preferable alternative. I believe that if domestic rates were replaced by a revenue received from income tax, the basic income tax would have to be increased by 4½p in the pound. In reply to questions, I have been told that this would be the sum required.
The Conservative Party, to which I proudly belong, strongly favoured the abolition of domestic rates. It was one of the tenets of our 1974 election manifesto. However, the May 1979 manifesto, while not dismissing the abolition of domestic rating from Conservative Party policy, clearly stated:
cutting income tax must take priority for the time being".
There have already been strong pressures in Parliament for a rethinking of the rating system. Last November my hon. Friend the Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr. Shepherd) introduced his Domestic Rating (Abolition) Bill, and the issue was again given a considerable airing. Several commentators writing in the Local Government Chronicle have suggested alternative rating systems, as has the National Union of Rate Payers Associations.
I am not looking for a complicated system. My suggested solution is a phasing out of the domestic rate over a considerable number of years, even to


the extent of a 10-year phasing-out programme.
My submission is fully supported by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister. In an article last year in The Daily Telegraph, Mr. Edward Taylor, a well-known name in this House, wrote:
Her dislike of rates as a form of taxation was made clear in a keynote speech in September, 1974, when she proclaimed: 'Rates are unfair because they are not related to ability to pay. The retired pensioner pays the same as his neighbour with a working family in a similar house. They are not related to services received. The basis of valuation gives rise to inconsistencies'
Therefore, it is clear that my right hon. Friend would still consider, even at a much later date, phasing out the domestic rate.
The facts are surprising. The values involved are high, but this year the total yield from the rates is about £6,100 million, of which £2,800 million comes from domestic rates and £3,300 million from industrial and commercial rates.
The problem is this. When the Government are dealing so effectively with the reduction of direct taxation, how can they take on this further load? Even though Back Benchers on both sides of the House would like there to be a change, there is no pressure to make it within the next year or two. But I believe that within the the next three or four years we could at least make a start. On the assumption that the economy is going along the way that my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer has predicted, there would be strong pressure from Conservative Back Benchers to consider phasing out the domestic rate.
The domestic rate is iniquitous. Every hon. Member must have received many letters on the subject, certainly from elderly people. Today's levying of rates on only one person per household ignores the great social changes that have occurred—including the emergence of the working wife and the great increase in the incomes of employed sons and daughters residing at home. All those in the household enjoy the benefits of the services provided by the local authority, but not all contribute to the cost, apart from their taxes paid to central Government.
The position that I have described is the main plank of the campaign. No

one objects to paying taxes on income received. What the vast majority of people object to is paying taxes for services that they do not take advantage of or that are not provided for them. Lay-field missed a great opportunity to point the way to a more economic and rational system of financial administration simply by chasing the illusions that were there at the time and ignoring the facts.
I am not advocating the total abolition of the system. However, it would lead to many economies, both direct and indirect. Rationalisation of the taxation system could be achieved by financing local government services from the only equitable and adequate source of taxation—the national pool. Pressure to abolish domestic rates will recur again and again.
We are committed to a fair society. There is nothing fair about a man improving the fabric of his building and perhaps adding heating or space only to find that he is the object of a rate increase. I have served on valuation panels and I know that such a man would have little chance of getting his assessment changed or of fighting the increase. The whole thing is a higgledy-piggledy mess of bureaucratic nonsense. There seems to be no solution. We have been hoisted by the fact that local government reorganisation committed local authorities to greater expenditure. Local councils have to find the money. A person may be able to claim a rate rebate. However, many are unable to do so, and the unfortunate are forced to pay more and more each year. The abolition of the domestic rate is only a long starter compared with what is beginning to happen.
In 1973, 10 regional water authorities were set up in England and Wales. Each authority was made largely autonomous and was given considerable control over financial policy and the collection of charges. The Bill was enacted on 1 April 1974. Prior to that date, water had been supplied to domestic consumers by many statutory water authorities. The disposal of waste water, sewerage, surface water and the supervision of other services connected with water, such as river management and pollution services, fire-fighting, street-cleaning and amenity services, had been part of a local authority's responsibilities.
The bills for water supply, commonly known as water rates, were quite small. Consumers have never been eligible for rate support grant or for rate relief on the water rate, although rateable value was used as a basis for calculation. The sewerage and environmental services were part of the general rate. They therefore qualified for rate support grant and for rate relief.
The anomaly in the water services charges is already apparent. Since 1 April 1974 regional water authorities have been responsible for these services. They have also been responsible for collecting charges. These charges, when separately billed, are of a considerable and significant sum. That has hit the public like a bolt from the blue. In some households the water service charges exceed the rates. Obviously, a person can get a rate rebate on the domestic rating side of the bill.
It is increasingly important that all hon. Members should hear and reflect the views of their constituents. As a result of using the gross rateable value as a basis for calculating those two charges, they are subject to all the objections that are applied to the general rates. One is that they are quite unfair to small households.
As a result, inequality has crept in, which completely disregards the fact that water service charges are a direct tax. Water is a service that one cannot deny oneself. It cannot be switched off or turned down, as in the case of heat. It is impossible to avoid a large bill, computed on the rateable value of one's house.
In my area the Southern water authority has received many objections. We should put an end to the foolish gossip that part of the reason is that members of regional boards drive around in 12-cylinder Daimlers or fly to Japan to see how water there is refined. The public will begin to doubt the managerial ability of water boards if such increases continue.
When the Southern water authority took over in 1974–75 there was no increase. The very next year—and it obviously found a lot to do in that time—there was a 40 per cent. increase. In 1976–77 the increase was 3 per cent. in 1977–78, 18 per cent., in 1978–79, 5 per cent., in 1979–80, 4 per cent. and in 1980–81, 29 per cent. It is a compound increase. The total percentage increase for 1980–

81 is 135 per cent. more than the 1974–75 rate. Over the same period, projected to 1980, the rise in the retail price index is 139 per cent.
I do not deny that perhaps work left undone or delayed has been brought forward. I am sure that the increases can be explained in many ways. Wage settlements in the not-too-distant past will have been partly responsible. Nevertheless, the water authorities' public relations officer must begin to indicate to the people receiving these bills that not only are the charges justified but that they are carefully monitored within the regional system, and more and more people interested in the consumer side will be encouraged to join the boards of regional authorities.
Politicians will not be able to defend water authorities. They are completely separate. They have their own financial structure. They are completely free under the 1973 Act to make profits. They cannot look to the Government for any losses. Unless the public feel that water charges will be more fairly imposed—and we all know that they are completely unfair at present on a figure plucked from the head of a valuation officer—my hon. Friend, the Under-Secretary, who works so hard in his Department, will face ever-increasing problems.
In reply to a question on 25 July, my hon. Friend said:
The water industry is currently considering the question of future charging systems, and in particular how far charges can be better related to demand.
I am sure that that is right. He went on to say:
Water authorities have the power, in cases of hardship, to make certain arrangements."—[Official Report, 25 July 1979; Vol. 971, c. 587–8.]
I am not sure what those arrangements are, but I am sure that my hon. Friend will do his best to press them. [Interruption.] I am not overruning time, Mr. Deputy Speaker. We started a little late and I am sure that you will be courteous enough to recognise that.

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Richard Crawshaw): We were two minutes late in starting. The hon. Member has now spoken for 17 minutes.

Mr. Hill: That sounds a fair time for two such momentous and grave topics. I should have thought that matters of direct


taxation would be of great interest to hon. Members present.

Mr. A. P. Costain: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Will you help the House? Is this subject of such importance? Will you advise how long the House has to debate this item?

Mr. Deputy Speaker: The times are set out for all hon. Members to see. We were due to begin debating this subject at 2 pm. The hon. Member for Southampton, Test (Mr. Hill) was right. We began at 2.2 pm. However, we must not go too far into the time allowed for the next debate, otherwise the last subject will not be debated at all.

Mr. Hill: I would be the last to do that, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I have had to wait too often myself.
I urge my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary to beware of the siren voices trying to establish another consumer council for the water industry. That is the last thing that we need. Responsibility must be taken by the regional water authorities and I do not think that it would serve a useful purpose if we were to retrace our steps in the direction of another consumer authority.
I had a great deal more to say, but I know that my hon. Friend has some interesting replies to give. He must be aware of the feeling about the abolition of the domestic rate and the inequity of the water services charges. I am sure that he will have the good will of the House if he is able to give us some hope for the future.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Marcus Fox): I shall do my best to pull back a few of the minutes about which you made such an impassioned plea, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Test (Mr. Hill) for giving the House an opportunity to discuss this subject today. I know of his long involvement in local government. I well remember an occasion when I tramped the streets of Southampton with him to good effect. I think that Southampton won the cup that year and my efforts and those of my hon. Friend

had a good effect on government generally.
In the spring, rates are very much in the news and they are not popular. Rates are a highly visible form of tax. One receives a bill, and one has to put one's hand in one's pocket. It is not surprising that any rate increase inevitably attracts criticism.
I do not pretend that I am happy with the general level of rate increases this year. They are higher than the Government would have wished. But I know that I do not have to remind my hon. Friend that decisions on rates are matters for individual local authorities. We did all we could to keep rates down, but authorities throughout the country have made their own judgments about what they can afford to spend. I need hardly say that it is Conservative councils, which are aware of economic reality, which tend to occupy the lower end of the range. Labour councils—including all the old familiar overspenders—are at the top, as usual.
During the long Committee stage of the Local Government, Planning and Land (No. 2) Bill, we are looking at this vexed question in order to find a solution.
The most important element of the rating decision is the volume of expenditure which a local authority is undertaking. Different authorities have different conditions and needs to deal with, so the decision will vary a great deal between one authority and another.
With occasional exceptions, the volume of local authority current expenditure has grown steadily each year for many years. We have acted to reverse that trend. For the current year 1980–81, local authorities have been asked to spend 2½ per cent. less in volume than they did in 197879. Last week in the public expenditure White Paper we published plans for further reductions in the years ahead. In 1981–82 local authority current expenditure is expected to fall by about 2 per cent., in 1982–83 by about 1 per cent., and by a further 1 per cent. in 1983–84.
That is the general pattern. It is an area in which the Government can be involved and one hopes that that will be reflected in rate bills in the future. We could simply go on paying more from central funds, but I am delighted that my


hon. Friend made it quite clear that he supports our underlying objective in this context as in so many others.
It is the only way which tackles the underlying problems of the economy—high taxation, too much unproductive public sector expenditure and high interest rates—and so contributes to the overriding goal of economic recovery. I hope that all those who blindly call for the preservation of expenditure levels which we simply cannot afford will recognise the vital need for the reductions we are seeking in local authority expenditure.
The size of the Government's contribution is another key factor in the local budget. For 1980–81 we have maintained a fair balance between the interests of the taxpayer and the ratepayer. We have kept the level of grants at a steady 61 per cent. of the relevant local authority expenditure, and we have made a stable distribution which halted the drift of grant away from the shire counties, such as Hampshire, and ensured that no authority suffered a heavy loss of grant.
My hon. Friend invited me to discuss the abolition of the domestic rating system. He was right to mention it as one of our longer-term objectives. We have never said that this can be done quickly. I welcome his suggestion that we should phase it over a period—in this context my hon. Friend mentioned 10 years. No one believes that it can be done speedily. We have made it clear in our manifesto that other taxation objectives must have priority. Nevertheless, I assure my hon. Friend that we are actively examining the possible alternatives to the domestic rates. My hon. Friend spoke of Layfield. Many other views have been put before us and there are alternatives. It is important that when the time is ripe we should opt for the right solution. I promise that this question is being considered very seriously.
On the question of rate relief, people do not understand the numbers involved in help of this kind. About 4 million ratepayers are eligible for this form of relief—about one-fifth of the total. The average rebate given is about £56 a year. This Government increased the allowances in the scheme last November and took the opportunity to remove the

anomaly which penalised recipients who were in work. Again, that is part of our general strategy which my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer outlined in his Budget Statement.
I turn quickly to the question of water charges. I welcome my hon. Friend's views on this matter. He only reinforced my own. I accept that this is an area of considerable controversy. My postbag day after day reminds me of the unpopularity of water charges. My hon. Friend drew my attention to the Water Act 1973 and the way in which the 10 autonomous, self-financing regional water authorities were set up. Under that Act the authorities must be self-financing. There is no way in which we can move away from section 30, because if we gave relief to one section it would mean that the cost was borne by someone else. If we relieved the domestic ratepayer, the extra charges would fall on industry and as a result there might be loss of employment.
There is considerable misunderstanding in the country about the way in which the water authorities operate. Perhaps there is a job to be done here in terms of communication. My hon. Friend spoke of public relations. It is true that the image presented by the water authorities is not always the best. It was unfortunate that the move towards direct billing was made by the last Government at a time of high inflation. In normal circumstances of the water bill being separated from the rates bill, there would have been a balancing factor in that the rates bill would have been reduced proportionately. It would not have been reduced by exactly the same amount—life is not like that—but there would have been some reduction in the rate bill. Unfortunately, that never happened. The rates bill has continued to increase and the extra charge of a water bill also arrives through the letter-box.
Also, this year the water bills in certain areas have arrived before the rates bills. If anything, that compounds the problem. Here is something new which is seen as an extra charge. I accept that water bills are now of considerable magnitude. My right hon. Friend the Minister of State has seen every chairman and chief executive, or is in the process of


seeing them, to discuss with them personally what are their objectives and the way they operate. We expect and, indeed, demand of them that they should be accountable.
My hon. Friend invited me to talk about ways in which we could make these bills more acceptable. I accept that the failings of the domestic rating system apply equally to water charges, both being based on rateable value. The corollary is that, once we change the domestic rating system, there is no way in which our system of water charges will continue. Some authorities have already moved away from that system. There is partly a standing charge based on cost and then another figure based on rateable value. So the two will follow each other. There may be a further inducement to get on with the task about which my hon. Friend has reminded the House and which was a commitment in our manifesto.
I assure my hon. Friend that we are looking at every possible way in which we can keep control over our water authorities. Without that, expenditure will continue to soar. We are looking at alternative ways in which measurement can be deduced and on which charges can

be based. One idea is metering. Two water authorities, I know, are carrying out a number of experiments. Nothing will be absolved from our investigation. I am sure that is what my hon. Friend is asking for more than anything else.
I hope that I have been able to reassure my hon. Friend. We have no intentions of forming another consumer council. I do not wish to mention this in the same breath but, immediately we came to power, we in the Department of the Environment turned our attention to those dreaded beasts called quangos. I hope that my hon. Friend can now sleep easy, assured that we have no intention of forming any new body to tackle this problem. We see it principally as a Government problem and a ministerial problem.
Despite this year's rate rises, we are tackling the question of domestic rates in four ways. We are reducing local authority expenditure in so far as we can control it. We are keeping up the level of grant. We are attacking inflation. In the longer term, we are seeking alternatives to domestic rates. I ask my hon. Friend, with his usual good sense, to be patient. I am sure that he will get what he is asking for in time.

IMMIGRATION PROCEDURES

Mr. Alfred Dubs (Battersea, South): I am glad to have this opportunity of talking about delays in this country's immigration and nationality procedures. They are a cause of great concern to many people. They cause much unhappiness and insecurity to numbers of unfortunate people here and on the Indian sub-continent. This is not intended to be an attack on the officials who run the immigration and citizenship services. Many of them have a difficult and highly sensitive job. They have important decisions to make affectng people's lives. Much of the criticism may be unfair if directed simply at the officials themselves. But it is fairly easy to show that the officials lack the resources and operate under difficult immigration rules. Many of the problems should not be laid at their door. They are the political responsibility of Ministers in the appropriate Departments.
I should like to turn first to immigration and deal later with problems concerning delays in nationality. I should like to talk about the position overseas. The queues of people waiting to be interviewed in connection with entry clearances have been getting longer. At the end of 1979, people were having to wait 24 months in Bangladesh and 22 months in Pakistan compared with 20 months and 19 months respectively the previous year. Happily, the queue in New Delhi is shorter, it is curently 10 months, but that is twice as long as the waiting period the previous year. Many of the people in these queues, particularly in Bangladesh and Pakistan, are wives and children. Their waiting time is particularly agonising. In order to speed up the process, additional entry clearance officers—called seasonal reinforcements—are drafted in from time to time. Will there be any such reinforcements during 1980?
I start with the position of United Kingdom passport holders—those normally referred to as East African or Ugandan Asians. There is a quota for them of 5,000 a year. In 1979, fewer than 2,000 in that category were admitted, presumably because of a lack of applications. The sting is that there is an unofficial quota of 500 from India, and that

is where people are having to wait so long that children who were under 18 when they first joined the queue have reached their eighteenth birthday and are having to join the list in their own right. That is a particularly unfortunate delay for people who are entitled to enter this country. It has unfortunate effects, particularly on wives and children who are waiting to come in, with all the attendant insecurity involved.
I wish to raise under a number of headings delays in the United Kingdom. The first heading is husbands who have entered this country as fiances and are awaiting permission to work. That takes an average of three to four months and during that time they are not allowed to work and may have to draw supplementary benefits, which may have undesirable effects. The delay is unnecessarily long, particularly as the key decision about their staying here is taken 12 months after the marriage, when the authorities check whether it is a proper one.
I appreciate that the numbers under that heading will decline because of the changes in the immigration rules. We have discussed the changes at length and I do not want to go over them now.
The second category is refugees awaiting asylum in this country. Fortunately, there are not that many, but they have to wait many months, and that causes them great anxiety because they do not know whether they will be allowed to stay. They cannot take work while they are waiting and they may have to depend on supplementary benefits. It is a small number of people, and their happiness would be greatly increased if they did not have to wait so long.
The next group are those who are detained pending a decision on whether they can stay here. In 1979, there were nearly 6,400 such people at Harmondsworth, and others are detained in other places. It would be beneficial to make a greater use of temporary admission rather than locking up these people, particularly as I understand that the rate of absconding among those who are granted temporary admission is low.
Work permit holders are admitted initially for 12 months and they may be given an extension of time for up to three years. In practice, the extensions tend to be given at 12-month intervals,


with the result that anyone with a work permit has to keep renewing it, which adds extra pressure on the officials and produces more paperwork. It would be beneficial if that could be eliminated by granting extensions for longer than 12 months after the initial 12 months.
The rules suggest that six months would normally be the appropriate time to allow a visitor to stay in this country, unless an extension is justified by "special reasons". In practice, visitors from almost the whole of Europe, the white Commonwealth and North America are normally given six months, but those from the Indian sub-continent are almost always given shorter periods and they have to apply for an extension of permission to stay. That also causes extra paperwork and puts more pressure on officials.
When interviews with London constituents are to take place in connection with entry clearance and related matters, many of the interviews do not take place in London itself but constituents are asked to travel to Sheerness. If they do not wish to travel, they may have to wait for a long time before they can be interviewed in London. I was surprised to learn those facts from a parliamentary answer.
I understand that there are occasions on which the pressures on immigration officers at Sheerness are so low that they can absorb some of those waiting to be interviewed in London. I was surprised to find that in 1979, out of 2,266 such interviews, 1,653 took place in Sheerness. It is unnecessary to ask people to travel long distances for an interview. It would be easier to draft some of the officials to London. I hope that the Minister will consider that matter to see whether the position can be improved.
I turn to the question of immigration appeals and the time taken in connection with them. There are various stages in appeals connected with immigration procedures. I shall not go through them all in detail. There can be a delay of four or five months in the time taken to prepare an explanatory statement, and it may be up to 15 months in the case of applicants in Bangladesh.
Further long delays occur in listing and hearing cases after explanatory statements have been received. Overseas applicants

may have to wait nine months to 12 months. There are even more stages which cause further delay. I understand that the previous Administration intended to recruit more officials as part-time adjudicators. Will the Government say whether they intend to increase the number of adjudicators so that the delays can be reduced?
I turn to the question of nationality. In a speech in Leicester some time ago, the Home Secretary said that he wanted to remove from those who have come to our country in post-war years the label of "immigrant" and to give them their place as full British citizens. We all agree with that sentiment. However, when people wish to take advantage of that opportunity they have to go through a very long waiting period while their applications are dealt with.
There is an infamous letter—I use the word "infamous" advisedly—which comes from the Home Office. It is sent to people who have had to wait a long time and who may have gone so far as to ask what has happened to their application. I shall quote briefly from the letter:
all such applicants are now subject to lengthy delays in the Home Office. These delays range from several months to over two years in some cases before a decision can be taken.
The letter continues significantly:
Enquiries about the progress of applications (of which there are many) divert the available resources from the work of considering applications and thus even greater delays ensue. It will not therefore be possible to reply to any further enquiries on your application.
By any standards, that is a monstrous way for officials to treat individuals who are making applications to a Government Department. There is an implied threat in the letter that if the applicant asks again about why the Home Office is so slow in dealing with the application, the applicant will have to wait even longer and the Home Office will not deal with any further inquiries. That is not the best tradition in which a British Government Department should deal with people who write to it with legitimate inquiries.
I appreciate that a slip of paper which accompanies all applications uses the same form of wording. It is an accepted part of the procedures of the Home Office. The result is that the backlog of applications is increasing year by year. In the


middle of June 1970, there were 5,500 outstanding applications, and by the middle of 1979 there were 35,500.
I understand that Sir Derek Rayner may be asked to study the workings of the nationality department. Is the Minister able to confirm that? If it is so, will the feeling of consumers of that department be taken into account? Will they have an opportunity to voice their views? Given the delays and the backlog, how long will applicants for entry clearance have to wait? How long will applicants for citizenship have to wait, given the length of delays faced by those who applied some time ago?
We are dealing with the way in which officialdom handles applications from individuals who are beset by uncertainty and anxiety. The individuals might be split from their families because of the slow progress of officialdom and, therefore, they will be unhappy about the long delays caused by the way in which we handle immigration and citizenship procedures. If the Government's intentions are to be taken to heart, I am sure that they will do their utmost to speed up the processes and not use the excuse that lack of money prevents them from improving the position for so many unhappy people.

The Minister of State, Home Office, (Mr. Leon Brittan): The original intention was that my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Mr. Raison) should answer the debate. Because of the events in Bristol yesterday, it is right that he should go there. I am, therefore, answering the debate on his behalf.
I am grateful to the hon. Member for Battersea, South (Mr. Dubs) for giving me the opportunity to speak about the work of the immigration and nationality department and of the efforts which have been made continuously by officials to deal with the rising tide of correspondence without commensurate increases in staff. First, I shall refer to the sheer volume of work which the department disposes of as efficiently and swiftly as possible in the circumstances. An examination of the scale of work puts the matter in perspective.
The department is currently receiving letters, mostly from the public and their representatives, at a rate of about 750,000

a year. About 11,000 come from hon. Members and noble Lords. All such letters are rightly accorded a high degree of priority over other business. Many of the letters enclose passports or other important documents. We receive an average of 5,000 passports a week, although we receive as many as 12,000 a week at peak periods. They need an early acknowledgment.
As hon. Members will be aware, there is a large public inquiry office and an associated telephone inquiry bureau at Croydon. The inquiry office is visited by large numbers of people—currently about 165,000 per year. The numbers calling daily varies from between 400 and 500 to 1,200 at the busiest times of the year. At peak times the facilities are overloaded and, as a result, waiting times increase. None the less, it is accepted that those who call are dealt with in a calm and efficient way, despite the language difficulties that arise from time to time. I think that we can be proud of the efforts that are made.
Against that background, hon. Members will appreciate that delays are bound to occur from time to time. In many areas correspondence awaits attention for a considerable time. I am afraid that, owing to difficulties in matching the numbers of staff with the amount of work, the position has deteriorated and the time needed to reply has increased. Everything possible has been done to improve matters.
I cannot accept that constraints in public expenditure can be airily dismissed in the way in which the hon. Member for Battersea, South seemed to do. The constraints are real. There are limits to the amount of money which can and should be spent on this facility. If the hon. Gentleman seeks to suggest that more money should be spent on it, perhaps he would like to suggest other areas of public expenditure where he recommends cuts.
Turning now to the more specific matters raised by the hon. Gentleman, I ought for the convenience of the House to outline the current position concerning the length of time applicants for our citizenship are having to wait before a decision can be reached on their applications. The average time which applicants for naturalisation and discretionary


registration are having to wait is currently 25 months. Applicants for citizenship by registration wait an average of 12 months. There are several different kinds of application for registration. Some require very little in the way of inquiries and consideration and can be completed within three or four months, but others require considerably longer.
The reason why applications for citizenship are taking longer to be processed than has sometimes been the case in the past is that the volume of applications has risen sharply over the last three years —a time when Governments of both political complexions have had to impose economies on the numbers of civil servants. Applications for naturalisation have risen by over 52 per cent. between February 1979 and February 1980 and by over 110 per cent. compared with February 1977. Applications for registration in February this year were 94 per cent. higher than in February last year.
It has been impossible, faced with an increase of this magnitude in the volume of applications, to provide comparable increases in the numbers of civil servants available to undertake the work. Nevertheless, last December my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary was able to announce that there was to be a small increase in the staff of the nationality division. Because of the need to contain public expenditure, the increase will not be as large as we would ideally have wished, but I am sure that it will help.
The hon. Gentleman referred in a disparaging way to a letter which is sent out on occasion and suggested that the notice in that letter in some way threatens applicants that, if they make inquiries, consideration of their own applications will be delayed. Nothing like that is said or implied in that letter or in any of the stock letters or notices. The general point is made that, if inquiries are made and are to be handled, that is bound to add to the total length of time that people have to wait. That is said clearly. In no sense is there any kind of individual threat by implication or directly in any of the letters.
It is regrettable that applicants for our citizenship should have to wait for so long. But it is only fair to point out

that very few applicants are seriously inconvenienced by having to wait. Most applicants already have their present national passports and can travel on them if they wish. Only stateless persons have no passports, and there are comparatively few people in that position. In any event, while they are waiting they can obtain Home Office travel documents which are accepted in lieu of passports by most countries.
I ought to outline what steps have been taken to simplify administrative procedures in the interests of speeding up consideration of applications. In the last year those administrative procedures have been simplified and strengthened to good effect. At the end of last year, virtually the same number of staff cleared 7 per cent. more registrations than in 1978 and 30 per cent. more naturalisations than in 1978. But there is a limit to what can be achieved in that way.
The hon. Gentleman also referred to long waiting times for entry clearance in the Indian sub-continent because of the number of applications for settlement made in those countries and the inquiries which have to be made in such cases. I am afraid that the deception practised in a minority of cases means that these must be thorough inquiries, even into cases which turn out to be genuine. Responsibility for administration for the entry clearance arrangements is primarily for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
With the staff available, everything possible is done to keep delays to a minimum—for example, by moving staff to posts where they are needed most. Priority is also given to applications for settlement from the wives of men settled in the United Kingdom when neither spouse has previously been married and any children are under 10 years of age. The waiting time for this priority category in the Indian sub-continent is currently up to three months.
At the end of 1979, the times waited by people interviewed from the main settlement queue—that is, non-priority wives and children, and other dependent relatives—ranged from 10 months to 24 months. The necessary inquiries into applications cannot be dispensed with. Nor are increases in staff likely to be feasible.
The hon. Gentleman referred to refugee and asylum cases. I am afraid that in


many of those cases inquiries take a long time, because it is often necessary to make inquiries abroad. Judgments about whether an individual is likely to suffer persecution in another country can be made only after careful assessment. As the hon. Gentleman will appreciate, a wrong decision can have literally fatal consequences for the individual if he is returned. On the other hand, to grant asylum lightly would devalue a status which should be granted only to those genuinely needing it and should not be come generally available as a means of avoiding immigration controls.
Unfortunately, oppressive regimes around the world are creating increased business for the Home Office refugee unit. The Vietnamese boat people are just one example of the problems involved.
The hon. Member also referred to the question of visitors. The position is that visitors who satisfy the requirements of the immigration rules are normally given leave to enter for six months, regardless of their nationality. The rules state that a shorter period should not be imposed unless there are special reasons to justify such a restriction. One such reason is that the case ought to be subject to early review by the Home Office. In such cases the visitor is normally given leave to enter for the period for which he has asked. Each case is considered on its merits. Details of the various periods for which leave is given are not kept, but I think that it can be properly assumed that a very large proportion have been admitted for the normal period of six months.
I turn to the question of delays in the appeals system. Delays exist, and in the main they are caused by a shortage of resources. They occur at two points. The first is in the preparation of the explanatory statement justifying the Government's decision. The second is in the time taken by the appellate authorities to set down the case for hearing.
In the case of the explanatory statements, the Home Office appeals section is currently taking about four to five months to produce statements in cases where the Secretary of State is respondent to the appeal. I think that that is a commendable rate, given the staff reductions that took place on that section ceasing,

in 1977, to accept statements for completion on behalf of posts overseas.
The overseas posts where the effect on dependants is potentially most serious are Islamabad and Dacca. My hon. Friend the Minister of State—the Member for Aylesbury—visited those posts last year and noted that all concerned were very alive to the importance of keeping a reasonable balance between, on the one hand, interviewing new applicants and, on the other hand, writing explanatory statements for applicants whose cases had been refused.
Our embassy at Islamabad had the benefit of having the statements written for it by the Home Office until 1977. Since resuming responsibility for its own statements, the time taken has on average not exceeded six months —a rate which compares very favourably with the much longer time taken when the statements were written by the Home Office.
When the cases reach the appellate authorities, there is, of course, a further lapse of time before the appeal can be heard—varying according to the particular case, obviously. It is not surprising that delays vary from centre to centre—three to four months for an appeal to be heard at Harmondsworth, six to seven months at Thanet House in the Strand, 10 to 12 months in Birmingham and Manchester and 12 to 14 months at Leeds. These are, of course, very rough estimates.
I am afraid, however, that, with the present overriding need to curtail public spending, it is not practicable to dispel these delays by pouring more resources into the system. In response to the review by Sir Leo Pliatzky of non-departmental bodies, we are looking at ways of improving efficiency by changing the rules of procedure. We shall shortly appoint more part-time adjudicators. Both those measures are designed to ensure that existing resources—hearing rooms and back-up staff—are used to the maximum advantage.
The hon. Gentleman is concerned about the length of time that people may be kept in detention. Detention may result from the actions of the police on arrest, the courts, the immigration service and the Home Secretary's making of deportation orders. However, I can assure the House that no one is detained for any longer than is necessary to enable any


appeal rights to be exhausted, any representations to be considered and the necessary travel arrangements—including the individual's documentation, which can be difficult—to be made. We are keeping the number of people in detention under close review, but the time taken to remove those who are detained varies considerably from case to case, and no meaningful statistics on the subject can be produced.
The hon. Gentleman raised the point that one of the future investigations into Civil Service Departments under the direction of Sir Derek Rayner will deal with the handling of applications for citizenship of the United Kingdom and Colonies. No doubt the matters raised by the hon. Gentleman in this debate will be taken into consideration during the course of that investigation. I have no doubt that the consumer's voice—as he calls it—will be brought to bear when that investigation proceeds.

OLDCHURCH HOSPITAL, ROMFORD

Mr. Michael Neubert: Passers-by in Parliament Square on the morning of Budget day were amazed to see the arrival of a 1928 fire engine in scarlet livery, with brass gleaming and bells ringing. In the front seat, open to the March weather, was a 33-year-old cancer patient, Mrs. Brenda King, from Rainham—a very decorative lady. Together with Mrs. Valerie Grootveld, from Collier Row, in my constituency, who is also suffering from cancer, and with other friends and supporters, she had driven from Havering in style and in considerable discomfort to present a 60.000-signature petition to my hon. Friend the Member for Hornchurch (Mr. Squire) and myself. They were protesting against the proposed closure of the regional radiotherapy unit at Oldchurch hospital, Romford. Both my hon. Friend—who is in China, and therefore cannot be here today—and I fully support their campaign. We have undertaken, if it becomes necessary, to present a petition to my hon. Friend the Minister for Health, so that he will be in no doubt about the strength of public reaction to the proposal.
In the meantime, we have asked the campaigners to continue collecting signatures. To those sceptics who say that a signature costs nothing, we can point out that active fund-raising in the last few weeks has raised several thousand pounds for the purchase of valuable computer equipment for the radiotherapy unit. That is another example of people's public-spiritedness in support of their Health Service.
For those reasons, I am more than grateful that this subject was selected for the last debate before the House rises for the Easter Recess. It is no less than those courageous campaigners deserve for their efforts.
Unhappily, this is the third such debate that I have had to initiate in a little over three years in defence of local health facilities in Romford. In the last debate before the House rose for the Christmas Recess in 1976, I argued against the closure of the regional neurosurgical unit at Oldchurch hospital. I was delighted when a reprieve was announced six


months later. Naturally, I hope that that occasion, with its coincidence of proximity to a Christian festival, will be a happy augury for today's debate.
Disappointingly, the neurosurgical unit is again under threat—the intended victim of another planning exercise by the London health planning consortium. The latest proposal will be resisted equally strongly.
Last May I argued against the closure of our excellent cottage hospital—the Victoria—which has served the community well for nearly 100 years. The Minister must now make a decision on that. Local people cannot understand why there are constant proposals from within the National Health Service to close down local facilities, particularly when figures published not so long ago showed that numbers on hospital waiting lists in the Barking and Havering health authority area were substantially higher than the average for England and Wales as a whole. "Will nobody", they ask, "in the upper echelons of the NHS stand firm and defend existing local facilities against constant soft-option suggestions of centralisation, contraction and closure?"
Yet there can be no surprise that, as in the case of this cancer unit, a working party consisting exclusively of medical and administrative specialists within the NHS should reach conclusions that are broadly professional and bureaucratic in character.
For instance, it suggests cancer treatment centres with catchment populations of 1 million, each centre with multi-disciplinary, co-ordinating and planning committees, all of which are presided over by a Thames cancer advisory committee. It is all too familiar. Distinguished professional people are bound to see the problem in terms of achieving the highest possible standards of medical treatment and to give a lower priority to the human implications of moving patients like pawns across an administrative chess board. But if the policy is "Patients first", who represents popular opinion in those committee room exercises? Whose National Health Service is it anyway?
Having once reached its theoretical solution, the working party was then obliged to fit its plan to local circumstances. In the case of the cancer unit at Oldchurch, it is literally a very painful

fit. It proposes that cancer patients at present attending at Romford for consultations and treatment should instead travel to Bart's hospital, in central London. Such a suggestion is not only inhuman and unfeeling; it is also impractical. To ask patients suffering from the most terrible of illnesses, and being mostly elderly, to travel to Bart's and back rather than to Romford, as they do now, to undergo treatment, with unpleasant side effects of fatigue and nausea, and to suggest that if the resultant ambulance journeys were too long and uncomfortable some patients might find it "more convenient" to use public transport, is a disgraceful denial of everything that a decent Health Service should stand for.
Ask the public what they think of that order of priorities. From talking to patients, and from my visit to the unit last Friday morning, I know that they are very satisfied with the service that they receive from the dedicated team at Oldchurch and would wish to forgo any notional improvements offered by a central London teaching hospital in favour of the convenience of local treatment. For them, the distress and discomfort of travelling to Bart's would be real and not theoretical.
The working party itself acknowledges the impracticability of its proposal by pointing out that it implies the need for hostel-type accommodation for patients to stay overnight who cannot sustain the two-way journey in one day. The cost is not mentioned. Could the ambulance service cope, anyway? It is already under severe pressure in London. What would be the cost of the extra vehicles and drivers who would be needed? The present cost of the London ambulance service works out at 90p per patient per mile. The round trip to Bart's from Romford must add at least another 20 miles.
There are other major disadvantages implicit in the working party's proposals. The proposals would destroy the present beneficial interrelationship between the radiotherapy unit and other departments within the district. The unit already has a radio-pharmaceutical department under development, and it serves as a base for physics medicine. It works closely with the neurosurgical, gynaecological and ENT departments at the hospital. The


training of junior medical staff would be adversely affected by this move, and there would be a waste of public investment implicit in the closure of a well-established unit and the break-up of a skilled team of medical and nursing staff. For all these reasons, I hope that the proposal will be rejected.
Of course, the provision of health facilities in this country is characterised by historic accident; of course, resources are not always evenly or appropriately distributed; but that is life. Naturally, it is important to ensure value for money in a public service, especially when money is short. But recent experience—come to that, the experience of Gaius Petronius, in AD68—has shown that sterile planning exercises can cause more problems than they solve, can cost more money than they set out to save and, so far as they represent only a substitution of error for accident, are no advance at all.
Contrary to what the London health planning consortium report says, there is room for expansion at Oldchurch hospital. Space for a second cobalt machine was deliberately left and stands empty today. If there is a risk that the present cobalt machine should, after nine years, break down, that is a risk with which we may have to live for a little longer.
But such inadequacies as there are should be met with a positive decision to hold the line until the necessary resources are available for expansion. In addition, there is ample evidence of public willingness to boost funds by voluntary effort. I have already mentioned the fund-raising that is in progress in connection with the latest campaign to raise money for a piece of equipment that is needed now for the radiotherapy unit. There is another major example of such effort in the raising of £175,000 for a hospice at Havering-atte-Bower. I believe that a solution to the problem of Victoria hospital could embrace similar local voluntary fund-raising in an attempt to bridge the gap between what can be provided from public sources and what the public themselves are prepared to commit in addition, to enable the retention of their own, well-loved local services.
Contraction and closure, on the other hand, can lead only to lower standards of local service and greater public dis-

satisfaction. We should resist such weak-kneed defeatism.

The Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Security (Sir George Young): As anyone who knows my hon. Friend the Member for Romford (Mr. Neubert) would expect, he has put forward a persuasive and compassionate case on behalf of those whom he represents, and I join with him in commending the courage of those disabled persons who came to the House on Budget day.
I fully understand the concern which my hon. Friend has expressed about the future of the radiotherapy unit at Old-church hospital. I have also heard about it from several people both inside and outside the House. My right hon. Friend the Minister for Health has been told of the petition which has been got up in the Romford area and which 60,000 people have signed. I shall arrange for my hon. Friend's office to be cleared to make room for it. I also commend the strength and initiative of local fund raisers. What my hon. Friend said towards the end of his speech about a partnership between the statutory health service and local voluntary organisations is very much in keeping with this Government's philosophy.
I should make clear, at the outset, that no decision has been taken to close the radiotherapy or neurosurgery units. The report which suggested the closure is the subject of consultation. It has been circulated widely and is being discussed by health authorities, community health councils and others who are interested. We will have to see what the area health authority and, in its turn, the regional health authority have to say about it.
The proposal arises from the report of a study group which was set up by the London health planning consortium. The consortium was itself set up in 1978 by the main authorities concerned with the Health Service in London. Its job is to look at major planning issues which affect London or the Thames regions as a whole. There are bound to be problems of this sort because of the size of London, which contains 19 area health authorities divided between four regional health authorities. More than anywhere else in the country, the provision of services and their planning has implications


across health authorty boundaries. And in the case of regional specialties, such as radiotherapy or neurosurgery, the problems often have implications for several regions at the same time.
London also contains 12 medical schools, and their needs have to be taken into account in planning. That is why the consortium was set up, to bring together in one planning body the four Thames regions, the University of London, the postgraduate boards of governors, the University Grants Committee and the Government.
As I have already indicated, one of the major problems that concerned the consortium was the planning of the main regional specialties. One of its priorities was to look at the distribution of these services across the Thames region. In many cases, units have been built up by different authorities over the years, almost in competition with one another. Many of them are small and not properly supported. To look into this problem, the consortium set up five independent study groups. They were asked to look at cardiac surgery and cardiology, at neurosurgery and neurology, at ophthalmology and at ear, nose and throat services, as well as at radiotherapy and oncology.
Each of the groups comprised eminent clinicians and specialists, who were asked, as far as possible, to take a detached view and to present proposals for achieving the best distribution of services across the Thames regions as a whole. They were concerned to secure the best treatment of patients. I ask my hon. Friend to accept that that was their motive. But that does not mean that they were insensitive to the convenience of patients. All their reports have now been completed and are the subject of consultation. All but one—the report on cardiac surgery and cardiology—are of importance, in different ways, to the Oldchurch hospital.
The study group on radiotherapy and oncology, whose report most concerns my hon. Friend, took evidence from a wide range of organisations, including both the health authorities and professional bodies. It visited the units that currently provide services and then reached its conclusions about the changes that were needed. It set as its aim to get a better organised service which

would enable more effective treatment to be given to patients. It took the view that this could best be achieved by concentrating services in cancer treatment centres, each serving a population of at least 1 million. Many of the existing radiotherapy centres in the country are of this size, and some are much bigger.
Because of the enormous cost of radiotherapy equipment, it obviously cannot be provided in every hospital that might wish to provide it. Larger units allow a fuller range of equipment to be provided. Breakdowns can then be covered and facilities for treating the rarer cases can be fully used.
The study group also felt that there were clinical and professional arguments for such centres. They ensure that each centre can retain expertise over the whole range of cancer treatment and contribute to training and research. We are talking here not about contraction of services but about concentrating them into large units that may allow better treatment for patients.
The provision of radiotherapy services is only part of the story. Drug treatment for cancer is also becoming increasingly important. The centres that the group proposed would be centres for medical oncology as well, but the group felt that it was essential for oncological services to be available in every district general hospital. This can be done, because there is less need for expensive equipment for oncology.
Many clinicians in every acute hospital will be dealing with cancer. The group therefore recommended that each district should have available to it the services of a radiotherapist and medical oncologist, even though the expensive equipment might be some distance away. The radiotherapist in those cases would hold joint clinics with other specialists, and would also have out-patient surgeries.
Of course, I recognise that there is a difficulty here. There may well be economic and medical benefits to patients in using the larger centres. But if, as my hon. Friend said, there are larger and fewer centres, people are likely to live further from them. The inconvenience for them and for their relatives is consequently greater. This is likely to be a particular problem in radiotherapy. Many patients are treated as out-patients, and courses


of treatment may require regular attendance over a period of time. In this case, therefore—perhaps more than in others —it is important to get it right.
The debate that is going on about the report may give us a clearer idea of what the right answer is. I shall ensure that my hon. Friend's remarks today are drawn to the attention of those who are now analysing the report. I believe that it is essential that the debate about the report should be allowed to run its course. Certainly, I and my ministerial colleagues have not prejudged the issue.
The radiotherapy unit at the Oldchurch hospital is an example of a small centre—a very small centre. The study group visited it and noted that it had a small local work load of under one thousand new patients per year. It has only one cobalt machine and limited support facilities. If its main machine were to break down, the service it provided would be in serious difficulties. The group did not regard the department as being "viable" in the terms that it had decided on, and it noted that it would be very difficult to expand it. A large investment would be needed before the unit could be brought up to the necessary size. It may be that the health authority will take a different view and that the general local support—which my hon. Friend mentioned—would make extra investment possible. We must wait and see.
Another factor that influenced the group was that one of the large units further towards the centre of London—at St. Bartholomew's hospital—had some spare capacity. A new linear accelerator was due to be commissioned at St. Bartholomew's and it felt that this would allow the work of the Oldchurch unit to be absorbed there. My hon. Friend is, rightly, concerned mostly with those who live close to the unit at Oldchurch. But this was a case where the group came to a different conclusion when looking at the wider picture. But the proposals in the report are not definitive or unalterable. Other proposals may be made and the health authorities and the consortium will need to examine them.
I shall return in a moment to the way in which decisions on the report will be handled. But I would like also to refer to the reports of the other consortium

study groups which have implications for Oldchurch hospital. Of these, the most important is the one concerned with neurosurgical services, to which my hon. Friend referred.
Oldchurch hospital has a purpose-built neurosurgical unit. It was established by the North-East metropolitan regional hospital board, because all the neurosurgical services for its area were to be found in the teaching hospitals—outside its control. The regional health authority has maintained the unit, partly because it felt it important to spread the provision of regional services more evenly throughout the region and away from the centre of London. The study group on neurology and neurosurgery found, however, that the unit at Oldchurch hospital faced considerable difficulties.
There were seemingly insurmountable problems in obtaining staff in some of the more specialised support services. Because of this, the units could not be used for advanced training and medical staffing, even at junior levels, has posed difficulties. This problem had been in evidence for some years and the North-East Thames RHA was due to review it in the near future.
The study group felt that only two major neurosurgical units were needed to serve East London and Essex and concluded that those at St. Bartholomew's and the London hospital were likely to provide a better basis for the service in the future. The problems which concentration poses are less serious in these specialties than in radiotherapy. Neurologists have, traditionally, provided outpatient services away from the main centres, and each district general hospital will continue to be visited by a neurologist. Furthermore, neurosurgery tends to be—I am happy to say—a once-in-alifetime experience. Travelling difficulties are therefore a less severe problem.

Mr. Neubert: Would my hon. Friend concede that in some cases, when people are acutely ill and have been involved in accidents, distance is of the essence if they are to survive?

Sir G. Young: In those cases my hon. Friend is absolutely right. However, I was referring to the more usual neurosurgical operations that are, happily, not the result of motor accidents.
I accept that the report on neurosurgery would also have an important effect


on Oldchurch hospital. I have no doubt that the local health authority and community health council are considering it closely.
The remaining two study groups looked at ophthalmology and ear, nose and throat services and their conclusions are generally favourable to Oldchurch hospital. The study group on ophthalmology, which was concerned only with the two North Thames regions, found that, in many places, in-patient services were very fragmented. Again, there are advantages in keeping in-patient services and operating facilities to a limited number of sites. Of course, there are a great many ophthalmology patients who are seen only as outpatients. It will always need to be possible for them to be seen at their local hospital. But the study group found that, in East London, the pattern of provision which it thought desirable already existed. Oldchurch hospital has a large unit of some 50 ophthalmology beds—well above the minimum size which the group recommended. The group was clear that the hospital should continue to provide a service to the whole of Barking and Havering and to some surrounding areas.
For ENT, the local service is split between Oldchurch hospital and Rush Green hospital. Each has 10 to 15 beds and the study group suggested that the service might, with advantage, be concentrated in one hospital. But it was its view that this was a matter which could be left to local planning. My hon. Friend also mentioned the Victoria hospital, Romford. After local discussions, the AHA has decided that it wishes to continue with the closure of the hospital. The matter now rests with RHA. If it agrees, it will be for my right hon. Friend to decide whether or not the AHA may proceed.
I also found it encouraging to see that the future for Oldchurch hospital is not entirely grim. A six-phase redevelopment of the hospital commenced in 1965, and the out-patient, accident and emergency, X-ray and neurosurgical departments were replaced. A new theatre complex is to be commissioned in 1980. Phases 5 and 6, yet to be programmed, will include new ward blocks and pathology and administration departments, and

will result in a completely rebuilt hospital of some 800 beds.
As I have said before, all these reports are now out for consultation. The London health planning consortium has not yet taken a view on them. Area health authorities, districts and CHCs are now bringing their views together, and regional health authorities, the university and the other parent bodies will then report back to the consortium. The consortium will have the problem of deciding whether the recommendations of the study groups should be amended in the light of views expressed on them, including those this afternoon.
However, it will also need to look at the interactions between them. In the case of Oldchurch, there is the suggestion that work in two specialties should be stopped, but, on the other hand, there is the possible expansion of a third. In other parts of London the problems of overlap are far more difficult, and the Flowers report on the medical schools in London is also likely to have an impact.
Once the consortium has reached its conclusions, it will be for the responsible health authorities or, if necessary, Ministers to take decisions about their implementation. In some cases, it will be a matter that does not affect more than one authority. Particularly at the peripheral parts of regions, it will be possible for the authorities to decide what they wish to do and to get on with it. However, any changes that they wish to make, if they involve closure or change of use of a hospital, will still have to go through the formal consultation procedure.
In other cases, however, the issue may need to come to Ministers for decision. These issues will not be easy to resolve or to carry through for the very reasons that my hon. Friend outlined. It is for this reason that we have set up the London Advisory Group to help us to ensure that the decisions taken are the right ones and to take account of the interests of all concerned in the Health Service.
This is a period of great change in London. Many issues have been left unresolved for too long, so that the changes needed now are more difficult to absorb. With the restructuring of the Health Service on the horizon, it is important that we should resolve as many of these issues as possible so that the new authorities


can be established on a firm footing, but it is more important that we should get the right decisions. That is why the reports that have been issued are being so thoroughly considered and discussed. My hon. Friend and his constituents have put their view, and I can give an under-

taking that they will be taken fully into account.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at twenty-eight minutes past Three o'clock till Monday 14 April pursuant to the resolution of the House of 2 April.